Dell and EMC continue to put in place the executive lineup that will lead Dell once it completes its $67 billion acquisition of the data storage vendor later this year.
Most recently, Dell officials wrote in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that Howard Elias, a 13-year EMC veteran and one of two executives who had been tapped to lead the effort to integrate the two companies, will become president of global services and IT of the combined company. Elias currently is president and COO of EMC’s Global Enterprise Services unit.
Rory Read, former CEO of chip maker Advanced Micro Devices who came to Dell in March 2015, will remain chief integration officer for the Dell-EMC merger, CEO Michael Del wrote in an April 11 email to employees, which was copied into the SEC filing.
The appointment of Elias comes a month after Dell and EMC officials announced other leadership plans, including saying Jeff Clarke will keep his titles of vice chairman of operations and president of Dell and naming EMC’s Jeremy Burton the merged company’s chief marketing officer and EMC’s David Goulden as president of the Enterprise Systems Group, which will include servers, storage networking and converged infrastructure.
The announcement of Elias’ role comes weeks after NTT Data officials said the company is buying Dell’s services unit for more than $3 billion, a move that will make NTT Data a larger player in the worldwide services market and give Dell much-needed cash as it prepares to buy EMC. Dell could take on as much as $50 billion in debt once the deal is completed, and Michael Dell reportedly is looking to sell some assets to reduce the burden. Dell also is shopping around its Quest software and SonicWall network security units, and reportedly is looking to sell EMC’s Documentum business.
The deal, which already has received approvals from U.S. and European regulators, is expected to close between May and October. EMC shareholders will vote on it this spring, and the companies are still awaiting the OK from other countries, including China.
After the deal closes, “the Dell and EMC II services capabilities will be combined to form an industry-leading global technology services organization to support customers’ migration from today’s platforms to tomorrow’s technologies and solutions,” Michael Dell wrote in his email. “In addition, the combined Dell and EMC II internal IT organizations will be a showcase for our customers as we help them on their journey to modernize, automate and transform their IT environments and build their digital future.”