Dell warns of third-quarter revenue slip

Dell has warned that its third-quarter revenue will fall well short of expectations due to sluggish consumer sales and a faulty component in its OptiPlex desktop PC.

The computer manufacturer said it expects revenue to be about $13.9bn versus its previous forecast of $14.1bn to $14.5bn, a difference of more than four per cent. Dell also said it will have spent an unscheduled $450m, or roughly 14 cents per share, on operational issues.

Dell blames its shortfall partially on sluggish consumer sales in the US and UK, which recorded revenues of $8.9bn and $2.9bn respectively in the previous quarter, which ended in July. Dell fell into similar territory in that quarter's financial earnings report, when it reported it had lost market share in nearly every regional market.

Dell said more than $300m of its $450m charge would compensate for a faulty capacitor - a hardware component that stores power and regulates voltage - found in a small percentage of its previous generation of its GX270 and GX280 OptiPlex desktop.

The company said: "The charge also includes the costs of workforce realignment, product rationalisations and excess facilities."

Dell spokesperson Jess Blackburn said a "small percentage" of Dell's 61,000 employees around the country were laid off as part of a company realignment.

Independent PC analyst Roger Kay said: "When companies make explanations for a shortfall in earnings, they take the two or three most obvious things to blame and focus on them so they can simplify the message. But quite frankly, it is usually more complex than that."

Kay points to Dell's 2004 annual earnings call, when the company declared a shortfall of about $10m in the consumer segment. Founder Michael Dell and CEO Kevin Rollins became defensive, Kay said, after financial analysts pressed them on the shortage.

"Michael Dell basically said, 'Well, if we can't trade them up or sell a monitor, we really don't want that business,'" Kay recounted.

Shortly after that, Dell began publicly talking about its strategy for its higher-prices XPS brand, a luxury line of computers that come with the highest upgrades of processors, hard drives and graphics boards available.

At the time analysts interpreted the move as an indication that Dell - which rocketed to the PC industry's top spot by building an efficient manufacturing operation that enables lower-priced computers - wants to feast on the fatter margins that come with selling snazzier gear.

However, some damage to Dell's sterling reputation may already have been done. The widening gap in PC sales between first-place Dell and second-place Hewlett-Packard took a turn in the third quarter of 2005.

HP grew shipments slightly faster than rival Dell, according to recent analyst reports. Gartner reported that HP experienced 17.1 per cent growth between 1 July and 30 September, while Dell grew shipments only by 17.8 per cent, nearly the same as the market overall. For Dell, that's slow.

Dell reports its quarterly earnings on 10 November.

Michael Singer writes for CNET News.com