Dell tries to sell subsidiary Perot to fund EMC deal

Dell is trying to sell its subsidiary Perot Systems, an IT services provider, for more than $5 billion. The reason for this would be a shortage of cash while the American company is in the middle of an acquisition of EMC, for an amount of 67 billion dollars.

The news comes from sources at tech news site Re/code. Those sources further describe the asking price as ‘ambitious’. Dell is said to have approached IT companies Tata Consultancy Services, Atos, Genpact and CGI with offers. To date, Dell’s efforts have not yielded anything concrete. According to the sources, Dell has been displaying Perot since before the announcement of the EMC acquisition plans. Dell and Dell’s co-owner, private equity firm Silver Lake, are saddled with approximately $50 billion in debt as part of the EMC acquisition, which the companies are trying to eliminate by selling parts of Dell. The American company bought Perot Systems in 2009 for 3.9 billion dollars.

In October, Michael Dell announced that his company would acquire data storage giant EMC for $67 billion. As part of the deal, EMC had 60 days from October 12 to raise a higher bid elsewhere. Last Saturday those sixty days were up. The deal will make Dell the largest in the enterprise storage market in one fell swoop. EMC has 70,000 employees.