As confirmed here on SiliconAngle today, the acquisition of Quest Software by Dell was officially announced. The move had been anticipated under a cloak of anonymity in a bidding war for some time.  John Furrier notes,

“This will augment Dell’s transformation to a full blown services company”

The move is indeed significant and is a watershed moment for the Round Rock, Texas company. Quest Software is known by many in the industry for their array of products that have served the IT industry for years and has embraced emerging technology trends early on, such as virtualization, cloud products, automation, backup solutions and so on.

Quest runs a very lean operation, with impeccable execution. Their nimble tech support group is technically excellent, responsive, and personal. It is not uncommon to speak to the same tech day after day. Quest also has a communities site that helps foster a collaborative support environment as well. Their professional services are largely comprised of a group of contracted partners who have gone an exceptional amount of training and certification. Quest bundles the services offerings heavily in pricing with many of their products and the value is exceptional by any standard. The operation minimizes significant technical issues through this services bundling.  Again, the execution is praiseworthy.

Quest’s products are innovative, focused on the enterprise, and reaches out to many customers on a number of levels. That forms one of the basics of Quest’s formula – Solid product, customer needs, alongside with personalized customer interactions. Dell has purchased not only exposure to Quest’s customers, but has positioned themselves deep into collaborative client relationships. That instantly changes Dell’s prospects and fits in with their services transformation in one brilliant and significant move.

As with any scenario where companies are acquired, it is likely that as Quest is integrated into the company, operational efficiencies and other strategic elements will be implemented from either side. In the case of Quest and their efficient, client focused service relationships, there will be a good deal of attention on what underlying message and systems make this approach work.