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Dell EMC
Company Profile

by Faulkner Staff

Copyright 2020, Faulkner Information Services. All Rights Reserved.

Docid: 00016844

Publication Date: 2010

Report Type: VENDOR

Preview

Dell EMC – which was born out of Dell’s 2016, $67 billion acquisition of EMC
– is one of the world’s largest storage companies. This firm provides
enterprise-class storage systems, software, and services worldwide. The current
Dell EMC portfolio focuses on cloud, converged infrastructure, data protection,
data storage, hyper-converged infrastructure, midmarket, networking, PC and
display, and server technology. This report examines Dell EMC’s operations in greater detail.

Report Contents:

• Fast Facts
• Profile
• Strategy
• Product Lines
• Activity

Fast Facts

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Name: EMC Corporation
Headquarters
176 South Street
Hopkinton, MA 01748
(508) 435-1000
Toll Free: (800) 782-4362
Fax: (508) 497-6961
Web:
https://www.dellemc.com/en-us/index.htm
Type: Computer Storage Devices
Founded: 1979

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Profile

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EMC – which was acquired by Dell for $67 billion in September 2016 – provides
enterprise-class storage systems, software, and services worldwide. Now
officially called "Dell EMC," the company operates under the Dell umbrella
alongside fellow brands SecureWorks, Virtustream, and VMware.

Prior to the acquisition, EMC had 70,000 employees, worldwide, representing
400 sales offices and scores of business partners in more than 86 countries.
Even while under the Dell Technologies umbrella, EMC continues to face
considerable competition in the lucrative and ever-expanding storage market. To
its benefit, the merger carried with it access to R&D centers in Belgium, Brazil, the Netherlands, Ireland, China,
India,
Israel, Russia, Singapore, and the US; as well as manufacturing facilities in
the US, Ireland, and Brazil to step up competition. Now, with the strength of
Dell’s hardware business behind it, Dell EMC is able to compete more directly
with even the most profitable of its competitors.

Currently, the consolidated Dell EMC portfolio focuses on core areas such as
cloud-based and converged infrastructure, data protection software,
hyperconverged infrastructure, midmarket products, and networking.

History & Milestone Events

EMC was established in 1979 by Richard Egan
and Roger Marino as a supplier of add-on memory boards. Significant events in
the history of the company have included:

• 1979 – Is officially founded.
• 1983 – Moves its headquarters to Natick,
  Massachusetts.
• 1986 – Goes public on the NASDAQ stock exchange.
• 1988 – Opens its European manufacturing facility in Cork,
  Ireland … Becomes listed on the NYSE. 
• 1990 – Debuts the Symmetrix line of storage systems based on
  hard drives for IBM mainframes and midrange systems.
• 1994 – Launches Symmetrix Remote Data Facility replication
  software.
• 1995 – Introduces Symmetrix 3000, a
  platform-independent storage
  system.
• 1996 – Releases Celerra and incorporates the NAS technology into
  its Symmetrix platform. 
• 1998 – Unveils Enterprise Storage Network, a SAN tool that manages access and control for
  multi-vendor
  servers, storage networks, and storage arrays.
• 1999 – Acquires Data General Corporation and
  integrates its CLARiiON midrange information storage system into
  Data General’s product
  line.
• 2000 – Introduces Symmetrix 8000 and CLARiiON FC4500 systems and
  software, and debuts EMC ControlCenter/Open
  Edition software.
• 2001 – Delivers its Automated Information Storage (AutoIS)
  management strategy, and released the CLARiiON FC4700 systems and software.
• 2002 – Acquires SAN management software supplier Prisa Networks
  to expand its automated networked storage product line.
• 2003 – Settles a patent dispute with Hitachi
  by agreeing to a five year contract.
• 2004 – Begins offering Content Storage Services.
• 2005 – Establishes the
  EDS Agility Alliance with Cisco, Dell, Microsoft, Sun, and Xerox; acquires Captiva Software.
• 2006 – Buys RSA Security.
• 2007 – Eliminates 1,350 jobs globally to cut
  costs … Spins off its VMware subsidiary.
• 2008 – Acquires Document Sciences Corporation.
• 2009 – Extends a deal with Microsoft, until 2011, to work on broader product
  interoperability and service delivery.
• 2010 – Acquires Archer Technologies, a privately held provider of
  governance, risk, and compliance management software … Acquires Greenplum and
  launches analytics database appliance based on its technology. 
• 2011 – Signs interoperability licensing agreement with IBM for
  the zMainframe server line … Acquires Netwitness, a provider of network security
  analysis solutions … Invests $100 million in new Big Data center in Brazil.
• 2012 – Announces plans to open a new R&D center in Russia
  to focus
  on cloud-based computing and Big Data … Forms an open cloud computing
  strategic alliance with VMWare and Atos.
• 2013 – Joins forces with Lenovo to found LenovoEMC, a joint
  venture focused on bringing co-branded NAS (network attached storage)
  technology to distributed enterprises, remote branches, and SMBs … Names
  Joe Tucci as President and CEO.
• 2014 – Acquires majority ownership of Virtual Computing
  Environment (VCE) from Cisco for an undisclosed amount. The purchased firm’s
  customers and assets are integrated into EMC Federation. 
• 2015 – Accepts a $67 billion buyout offer from Dell, with
  the two
  companies planning to merge their assets at the closure of the agreement in
  2016.
• 2016 – Sees the Dell merger close, resulting in the
  creation of the new entity known as "Dell EMC."
• 2017 – Divests the Dell EMC Enterprise Content Division … With
  General Dynamics and Microsoft, is awarded a five-year, $1 billion contract
  to implement a Cloud Hosted Enterprise Services program for the US Air
  Force.
• 2018 – Partners with Intel, NVIDIA, and CoolIT Systems to
  increase collaboration within the Dell EMC HPC and AI Innovation Lab in
  Austin, Texas … Reaches a separate agreement with Intel to allow "Ready
  Solutions" users to focus on AI and machine learning technology using Intel
  … Among dozens of offerings, unveils PowerEdge MX modular
  infrastructure, Ready Solutions for AI, HPC support services, and
  hyper-converged infrastructure advancements.
• 2019 – Unveils new PowerProtect Data Domain-series appliances and
  accompanying management software … Introduces VMware Cloud on Dell EMC …
  Joins Intel, Cisco, Facebook, Google, HPE, Microsoft, Huawei, and Alibaba in
  establishing the Consortium for Developing CXL (Compute Express Link)
  open-interconnect technology.
• 2020 – Unveils PowerScale storage systems, EMC "Ready" Solutions
  for VMware Cloud Foundation, the PowerStore "modern" infrastructure
  platform, and "Edge" systems and software.

Strategy

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report]

Through EMC, Dell focuses on helping to modernize, automate, and transform the data center
via "industry-leading" converged infrastructure, servers, storage, and data
protection technology. In particular, the company works to provide a "trusted"
foundation for transforming IT, developing new and better ways to work through
hybrid cloud-based technology, create cloud-native apps, and offer Big Data
solutions. Specific, strategic areas of focus include:

• Transforming IT via cloud-based technology
• Transforming business via Big Data
• Focusing on other strategic differentiators such as Flash-based
  architecture and security

Strengths

The establishment of Dell EMC created a strong business brand that functions
as a $74 billion market leader for IT and asset management, with an expansive
portfolio covering hybrid cloud, software-defined data center, converged
infrastructure, PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service), data analytics, mobility, and
cybersecurity. The combined company:

• Holds worldwide storage market leadership (27 percent)¹
• Serves 98 percent of Fortune 500 companies
• Comprises several market-leading businesses

Weaknesses

Traditionally, storage-related sales tend to offer higher margins than PC and
server revenues. This greater profit potential has attracted some of Dell EMC’s
stiffest competitors – such as HPE, IBM, NetApp, and Hitachi – to the market.²
Much like its fellow storage vendors, Dell EMC is also subject to the whims of an
always-shifting market space. This factor is especially true when considering
potential risks such as:

• Delays in development.
• Changes in technology requiring product changes.
• Difficulty in forecasting customer preferences.
• An inability to expand production capacity.
• Trouble managing interoperability and transitioning from older
  products.

Other weaknesses that EMC continues to face include a potential difficulty in
managing operations; pricing and other competitive pressures; business,
political, economic, or regulatory changes on a country-by-country basis; and
distribution channel or alliance risks.

Outlook

Dell continues to position EMC to execute its long-term strategy, better
capitalize on their combined portfolio, and target "every stage of the digital
transformation journey." According to CFO, Tom Sweet, the key to EMC’s
longterm success under the Dell umbrella is "flexibility. We’re seeing increased
adoption of our portfolio delivered as-a-service through flexible consumption
solutions, which are now on a $1.3 billion revenue run-rate, up 30 percent
year-over-year.”

The company believes that – as market needs shift – Dell must continue to
execute on its strategy for EMC to win in consolidating markets, paired with
Dell’s own long-term investments in driving value creation.

Product Lines

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Despite introducing popular brands such as CLARIION, Symmetrix, Centera,
ProSphere, and Connectrix over the years, EMC is currently positioned primarily
to offer virtualization-related products, as detailed in Table 1.

Table 1 lists and describes Dell EMC’s current core products.

Major Competitors

• BMC Software: http://www.bmc.com/
• Cisco Systems: http://www.cisco.com/
• Fujitsu: http://www.fujitsu.com/
• Hewlett Packard Enterprise:
  http://www.hpe.com/
• Hitachi Vantara:
  https://www.hitachivantara.com/
• IBM: http://www.ibm.com/
• Microsoft: http://www.microsoft.com/
• NetApp: http://www.netapp.com/
• Oracle: http://www.oracle.com/

Activity

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Products and Services

VMWare has released its
second-gen VMware Cloud on Dell EMC This
cloud-based service combines public cloud options with the
on-premise infrastructure security and control. The release was
developed alongside Dell
Technologies.

(05/25/2020)

Dell
Technologies announced the Dell EMC PowerStore, which
offers a “modern” infrastructure platform for managing data. The
release includes features to accelerate decision-making, data
access, and application performance with near-100 percent
availability. Support is included for scale-up, scale-out
architecture; streamlined speed; ML (machine-learning) and
intelligent automation; streamlined application development and
deployment timeframes; autonomous infrastructure; CloudIQ
storage monitoring and analytics; container-based architecture;
the AppsON function for deploy apps directly on the array; and
eased migration tools.

(05/05/2020)

Dell
Technologies introduced a new subscription-based model for
the Dell Cloud service portfolio. This introduction is designed
to assist with more easily buying and scaling hybrid clouds, and
is expected to help more predictably forecast risks, scaling, and
optimizing the infrastructure “from deployment through expansion
and retirement.” The new subscription model is now available as
part of Dell
EMC‘s VxRail.

(02/25/2020)

Dell
EMC introduced new systems and software for addressing
opportunities and challenges at the “edge.” Releases include the
PowerEdge XE2420 compact, “short depth,” high-performance
server, which offers 92TB of storage per server; the Modular Data
Center Micro 415 system for more “far-reaching and rugged”
environments; and iDRAC9 Datacenter software that offers remote
access and, generally, a more secure server-management
experience, “from the edge to the core to the cloud.” Additional
details and specifications are
available via the Dell Web site.

(02/18/2020)

References

¹ "Enterprise Storage Systems Market Share." IDC.
September 17, 2020.
² Ibid.

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