Dell Revenues Flat, Profit Dives in Q2 Earnings Report

Dell, facing increasing pressure from both the markets and its shareholders, moved up its scheduled quarterly earnings disclosure five days to Aug. 15 to report flat year-over-year revenue and a sharp drop in profit.

The Round Rock, Texas-based computer hardware, software and services provider offered no insight because it canceled its regular conference call for analysts and journalists, choosing to post a press release on its Website instead.

In the background, founder Michael Dell and financial backer Silver Lake Partners are offering to buy back the company from shareholders for $13.75 per share, with another 13 cents per share kicking in when the deal is closed, adding another $350 million to the $24.4 billion that was initially proposed. A substantial number of shareholders, including billionaire investor Carl Icahn, are fighting Dell to keep the company public.

“Given the company’s announcement on Feb. 5 of a definitive merger agreement to take Dell private, the company is not providing an outlook,” the company said in the earnings press release.

Dell reported revenue of $14.5 billion, slightly better than a year ago. However, the company profited $204 million in the previous quarter, compared with $732 million in 2012—a whopping 72 percent drop.

Operating income for the quarter was $272 million. That, too, was down substantially (70 percent) from the $901 million reported in Q2 2012.

Cash flow from operations in the quarter was $1.7 billion. Dell ended the quarter with $13.9 billion in cash and investments.

Division-wise, the best news came from the company’s Enterprise Solutions, Services and Software group, whose revenue totaled $5.8 billion and grew 9 percent year over year.

The numbers include sales from the 2012 acquisition of California-based software tools company Quest Software, which since has been rebranded to Dell Software.

Dell’s End User Computing reported that its revenue was down 5 percent year over year.