Dell-usions of grandeur?

On Mon., Nov. 1, Apple released a competing press release, where it "confirmed that it holds the number one position in sales to the U.S. Education market," citing numbers from Quality Education Data and International Data Corp. Although at least one source of the disparity seems to be that the reports examined computers currently in classrooms and second-quarter sales, respectively, not the third-quarter.

Who cares? Yalies should. In a market where Apple has maintained dominance, in part due to existing investments, if Apple is losing share to a single Windows/Intel (Wintel) vendor, then it is most certainly doomed. Jennifer Ackman, a spokesperson for Apple, said, "Apple is continuing to provide the best and easiest technology solutions for students and administrators alike. Having the best products on the market is the only way to ensure that Apple maintains its lead in the education market. And with great products like iMac, iBook and the G4's, I think we are pretty successful."

This flippant response was in sharp contrast to an extensive explanation of Dell's higher education strategy from Ben Bentzin, Director of Marketing for Dell's higher education division. "We don't really see a lot of value in quibbling [over the recent statistics]," he said. "The trend is clear....Wintel-based, and Dell in particular, have grown steadily."

Bentzin described the goals of Dell in higher education as providing the lowest-possible cost while being focused on industry-standard computer systems. One key aspect of their strategy is the Internet. Campuses that have an agreement with Dell get "premier pages," of which there are already more than an thousand, where IT professionals and students can find an "array of tools to help you manage the purchase and support of Dell computers on campus." A separate service called Dell Plus allows computers to come preconfigured for a given campus.

In general, he said that his higher-education approach works toward a "high degree of intimacy" and is "focused exclusively" on its market. In contrast to corporate sales, for example, the larger an educational institution gets, the less centralized it is, something the Bentzin feels is important to take into account.

Bentzin also responded to complaints some students have had about ordering from Dell. For example, he said that backlogs in purchases this September were the result of supply problems, not a specific result of education customers. He said, "That bubble [of summer purchases] is actually relatively small [compared to total sales." He said that he did his best to "steal" computers from other divisions to try to supply the educational customers in September as quickly as possible.

As for all the poor students toting Dell boxes from Hendrie Hall to Pierson and Davenport or those who have had trouble getting on-site service, he had little to offer. He said, "This issue of providing on-site service, say, to the dorms or the delivery of PCs on campus is a higher education-wide issue." He said that some campuses have central delivery points for security reasons, and that this and service are worked out by represetatives on a site-by-site basis.

Bentzin could not comment on the eventuality of a deal with Yale's Microcomputer Sales Center, though he did explain they already have a deal with the School of Management. He also had no Yale-specific statistics. "My understanding is that Dell is a leading brand on campus," he said.