Solutions. Cloud. Mobility. Datacenter. Solutions again. Dell is a new company. It was evident at the recent Dell World 2011 held in Austin. There was a distinct zip in Michael Dell’s walk and what was most exciting about the event was witnessing the roadmap and the transformation of Dell as a company. The IT industry in general has begun one of the most exciting times yet. More than the overall IT industry, SMBs are going through a major transformation moving from enablement to empowerment. And Dell seems to be moving with that transformation lock, stock and barrel.

Cloud and Solutions have become front and center - solutions that are designed and imagined to directly address business issues such as productivity, automation, enhancing sales and marketing, reducing operational cost and many others.

Some may begin to call Dell the new IBM. However, unlike IBM, Dell is addressing entire sets of market segments – small businesses, mid-market businesses, enterprises, government, healthcare, consumers. Dell’s recent different acquisitions are playing a big part in its transformation. Most notable among them have been Boomi, SecureWorks, KACE, Compellent, InsightOne and Perot Systems. Dell may have fewer big case studies as of now compared to IBM but it will get there.

PCs, servers and general computing hardware are still relevant to Dell’s business and integral to its growing arsenal of solutions. PC is still relevant to businesses and consumers alike. Those who predict the PC is dead are not seeing the picture correctly. They are probably getting carried away by the current “wave” of tablet adoption. However, the nature and use of the PC as the foundational block has changed. An SMB today can start work immediately with a server that resides in the Cloud, use a smart phone that provides access to corporate information anytime and anywhere, a CRM application that resides off-premises, a communications infrastructure that is cost-effective, and a line of business application that is plug-and-play. At Dell World 2011, Dell demonstrated solutions in each area such as device management, unified communications, cloud business apps, collaboration, storage, datacenters, expense management and many others.

Traditionally, the IT industry gets caught up in terminology such as Cloud, Mobility, Managed Services, Big Data and so on. We had written that vendors have a real opportunity now more than ever to tweak their messaging to take on a series of statements that explain what the new IT can do for SMBs and enterprises in terms of functionality, operational cost, fixed cost, profitability, and how it benefits their business plan. Or even in more simple terms, messaging such as: how can a business use a PC to connect to
line of business applications faster, more securely, and from anywhere to help
them run their business better. We have begun to see this messaging from Dell.

Anurag Agrawal
Techaisle