CES 09 - Dell Embraces Design And Customization

I am here at CES listening to a Dell briefing. Here are the names of the speakers:

• Micheal Tatelman - Vice President, Global Consumer Sales and Marketing
• Alex Gruzen - Senior Vice President, Global Consumer Product Group
• Ed Boyd - Vice President Consumer Experience Design Group

Here are some liveblog notes from the discussion.

Dell has:

• Changed the face of the company through innovation.Broadened their portfolio worked with retails to reach offer value pricepoints. Dell has a strong retail and direct business. Their challenge was to deliver great products at each pricepoint.
• Focused on bringing customers products through retail (20,000 locations around the world). Growing global retail foot print.
• Has focused on a green strategy including green packaging, ReGeneration and Dell Earth.
• Built better relationship with retailers.
• Invested in personalization so consumers feel product is built for them.
• Brought in artists from around the world for the Design Studio.
• Announced the Design Studio on December 2.
• An initiative to support Malaria in Africa called "Red".
• Developed the Studio Hybrid which is green(smaller, less shipping, less energy to own and operate, ability to disassemble after life of product) and fits into your environment (small, less clutter, different color sleeves for CPU).
• Developed the Alienware line for gaming
• Have an extensive line of accessories.

NEW DELL announcements:

• XPS 625 Dragon Platfrom, AMD Phenom, Editor Crossfire Graphics, Water cooling and starts at $999 (click here for the press release).
• Dell will be pre-installing Windows Live Essentials to make PC's work better together and provide functionality including social networking.
• Dell USB Digital Tuner - regional broadband standard to offer FREE over the air HDTV. People can get to TV content whever they are. Dell announced today the new USB Digital TV tuner for the Dell Inspirion mini line.
• Dell announced the new Studio XPS line (click here for the press release): Studio XPS 16 & Studio Hybrid 13 have state of the art technology, top of the line with special design aspects such as leather, LED backlight displays, top of the line color/resolution, audio speakers (including sub-woofers).
• The Inspirion 15 laptop has hit a new sweetspot pricepoint (starting at $600). The Inspiron Mini 12 and Inspiron Mini 9 netbooks are also reasonably priced. With all the personalization options, consumers that want to save money don't need to pay for custom colors or other extras.
• The Dell G-Series LED Monitors deliver performance and energy efficiency.

I also looked at the Dell Community site that offers information on topics and support.

Click HERE to see the pictures at the bottom of this post.

The Studio XPS line:

The Dell XPS All-in-One:

The Dell Mini netbooks:

Tristan Eaton and his designs:

Video interviews at the event will be loaded later today.