Dell may buy Alienware

UPDATE 16:02 GMT Alienware sent a comment on Rahul's speculation. "Alienware can not and will not comment on any speculative stories such as the one that appeared on Rahul Sood's blog yesterday. While we do believe that the story is ultimately a strong positive reinforcement of the Alienware brand and the company's success, we will not comment on speculation or potential future events. As always, Alienware is committed to offering consumers and businesses with the best high-performance, innovative PC products on the market and we remain manically focused on that goal."

RAHUL FROM VOODOO and I mostly see eye to eye about the computer industry, the exception being rabbit induced hallucinations. This time, he is saying that Dell may buy Alienware. You know, it makes a lot of sense.

Dell has two problems, it is approaching stagnancy in their main markets, and is about as exciting as an American cheese on white bread sandwich. Michael Dell's fairly desperate PR raising attempt at every CES keynote shows it wants to look 'cool' but can't, no matter how hard it tries. That is why an acquisition or 12 makes sense, lord knows it has the cash.

The XPS line is doing well, but it has about the mindshare of toenail clippers among the hardcore set. Yeah, it needs an image boost badly, and buying Alienware would be the quickest way to do that. The company is the volume leader in the gaming market, something Dell is sure to love, and the price would be pocket change.

Overall, I think it will happen. There are some integration problems, and that pesky AMD thing that Alienware sells so much of to deal with too. Both can be managed, integration is the Dell hallmark, and AMD is a nice way to back them in with plausible deniability to Intel.

My main issue with the Dell/AMD hookup was volume, and this would be the perfect way to slow start the deal. I think this will happen, sooner rather than later, and it will lead to an AMD/Dell product. Eventually. µ

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