Dell complaints

Shares of Dell (DELL) are down $1.12, or 7%, at $13.96, after the company this afternoon reported fiscal Q1 revenue and earnings per share below analysts’ estimates, and forecast a Q2 revenue rise less than expected.

Revenue in the three months ended May 4th fell 10%, quarter over quarter, and 4%, year over year, to $14.4 billion, yielding EPS of 43 cents, excluding some costs.

Analysts had been modeling $14.91 billion and 46 cents EPS.

Revenue from the company’s large enterprise customers declined 3%, while public sector revenue was down 4% and small and medium business revenue was up 4%.

The biggest decline was from consumers, where revenue was down 12%.

Within product category, server and networking revenue was up 2%, while storage revenue for the products Dell owns (as opposed to resells), rose 24%, to $423 million.

Personal computer revenue in the desktop category fell 12%, while mobile PC revenue was down 13%.

Dell’s CEO Michael Dell remarked that the company saw “continued progress in our first quater with the innovative IT solutions we’re providing.”CFO Brian Gladden said the company had seen a “challenging environment” during Q1.

From "Seeking Alpha"

Dell (DELL) can't seem to keep its promises.

In addition to missing its numbers for the quarter (EPS 3 cents shy of consensus, revenue light by $500 million), Dell ducked its year guidance.

It's not the first time. I wouldn't harp on it if Dell didn't make investors a promise. After all, lots of companies don't give longer-term guidance. Apple (AAPL) doesn't. Still, tell me you're going to do something and I expect you to do it.

Here's what Dell promised last November.

We look forward to providing you with an updated outlook for FY '13 in February and continuing to update you on the progress that we're making.

Didn't happen. In February, Dell delayed year guidance:

With our primary objective continuing to be one of reshaping the company for the future, combined with today's more uncertain environment and our continued pruning activities, we're not providing a revenue outlook for the year. We feel this will allow us to focus both externally and internally on our key strategic priorities. We plan to update our longer-term outlook at our analyst meeting in June.

So, today did we get that longer-term guidance? Not a chance. Instead, Dell provided more procrastination. (See also earnings call transcript.)

Based on the uncertain environment and our 1st quarter results we expect to update our full year guidance on the 2nd quarter earnings call in August.

I wouldn't count on getting that forecast in August. At this rate, don't expect to get Dell's year outlook. Think of this as a Dell leap year. Unfortunately for shareholders, the future is just too grim and murky to put a number on.

One can always cheer Dhell on when it swirls around the edge of the toilet! Hurray!

_________________
Former employee of Dell and can say that they
definitely Suck!