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Technology Stocks : Dell Technologies Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jorge who wrote (32969)	3/7/1998 8:21:00 PM
From: Phillip Crone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 176387

To all: last comment for the night. This whole box business is starting to remind me a little bit of the automotive business. I have always compared the computer business to the auto business to compare how they have matured and what markets are hot to do business in. Auto's are transportation and we went from the horse and buggy to the internal combustion engine. We went from the pen and pencil to the computer to make a long story short. My point is that many of the people on this thread and others like HWP and CPQ are becoming a bit religious about their boxes, much like most people are very religious and loyal to either Ford or Chevy etc.... Almost all large national industries come down to the big three. The computer box market is maturing and certainly has come down from 20 or more major players in the US to about 5 or 6 now. I'm not criticizing any of you for being loyal to your box, just pointing out the change and conviction. I for one, even though I am in the business am not really loyal or attached to any box. I am more concerned about the internal part names than I am about the name on the outside of the box. This is what "brand names" are all about so maybe all of you can come up with other areas that Dell can become involved in when the margins on boxes dry up over the next few years. How about Dell high definition TV's or maybe Dell direct satelite TV dishes, or Dell cellular phones and hand held PC's. Maybe Dell could buy out Data General and immediately call them DELL. Maybe Dell should just buy Wang?? Sorry to carry on but my Saturday creative juices are flowing.

To: Jorge who wrote (32969)	3/7/1998 8:39:00 PM
From: Chuzzlewit	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 176387

George, I read his comments several times, and I'm not sure. I would have guess that the major inventory problems would be in the weakest area of sales, and Pfeiffer said that that was commercial sales in North America, so if you forced me to predict where those price cuts will be I'd have to say commercial, and largely servers. Now, this raises a very interesting issue. Because of the magnitude of the inventory build-up, Pfeiffer estimates that it will take more than one quarter to clear. But, prices of components have been falling, so it is entirely possible that Compaq can sell computers at the same price as Dell and lose money (because of their higher costs), while Dell makes money. The other interesting point in the conference call is that Pfeiffer blames slowing demand for the inventory problem, while other manufacturers see healthy sales. But I must ask how, if Compaq was implementing a JIT type system, their inventory got so far out of balance? Regards, Paul