Dell targets growth as end-to-end solutions provider

‘Enterprise, consumer lines blur in IT’

MANILA, Philippines — Consumer demand accounted for 25 percent of Dell EMC Philippines' business in 2017, with the balance attributed to enterprise spending. Despite the figure, consumer share actually reflects health, according to Ronnie Latinazo, country general manager of the Hopkinton, Massachusetts-headquartered multinational corporation that sells data storage, information security, virtualization, analytics, cloud computing and other products and services. In an exclusive interview with The STAR, Latinazo said the consumer segment of its business has “grown by a lot in the last few years. It wasn’t as big a contributor for us… now we definitely see our consumer line as a major growth engine for us.”

Latinazo said this as Dell debuted here a trio of new Inspiron 7000 products: the Inspiron 13 7000 2-in-1 (P63,490) and laptop (P51,990) with new eighth-generation Intel core processors, and new Inspiron 15 7000 gaming laptop (P73,990). In a release, the firm said “these new innovations demonstrate Dell’s commitment to providing the best audio and visual computing, virtual reality (VR) and gaming experiences for consumers.”

Dell Philippines consumer head Jay Ranola said: “Our new devices showcase Dell’s leadership in innovation across personal computing, gaming and virtual reality… The beautiful new Inspiron laptops and 2-in-1 include some of the best designs with incredible visual experiences, exceptional performance and support to match.”

For Latinazo, the most recent rollout is an indicator of Dell’s aggressive foray in the segment, particularly as this one obviously targets holiday spending power. “That’s the reason we’ve been introducing innovative products in the local market, and we hope to continue to do that to further our growth here,” he stressed.

Still, the executive maintained Dell is interested in growing other aspects of the business. “I think the pie is big enough to grow in all areas – from the server line to the storage, to networking, then consumer,” continued Latinazo. “There are seven brands (with Dell) and each one is a key brand for us all targeted in different areas of the market… we are unique in a sense that we are one of the few players who still continue to be positioned in the end-to-end as an infrastructure provider.”

Even as this latitude of offerings is typically more attractive to enterprise customers, Latinazo opined that the demarcation line between this and the consumer segment is blurring. “If we look at IT, there are several areas,” he declared. “There’s an IT transformation side; there’s also the security transformation side, and workforce transformation. You will see that companies are trying to adjust to the changing times, habits, and lifestyle of the workforce.

“Consumers and employees are more mobile,” he observed. “As soon as they wake up in the morning, they go into social media. Today, work is no longer a place to be in. It’s more a mindset… A lot of employees are bringing their own devices. It’s no longer about companies providing those devices. It could be a mobile phone, laptop, or desktop at home – and companies need to support all that to increase the productivity of employees.”

Indonesia-based Elizabeth Pabunag of Dell EMC’s regional office said that the company still does a lot of work to “help customers realize that IT infrastructure needs to change,” and involves itself in “conversations in different industries.”

Again, this all ties in with the company’s push to sell its complete and comprehensive suite of products and services wherever and whenever customers – consumer or enterprise – need them.