Dell Went Private. HP Split in Two. AI Picked a Winner. | Tech history

Around 2013, Dell and HP were facing the same problem: smartphones and tablets were eating into the PC business. Each company answered it in the opposite way. A decade later, the AI data center boom showed which answer paid off. This hand-drawn episode of Tech history follows both companies. Dell's path: going private with Silver Lake in 2013, after a public fight with Carl Icahn. Buying EMC in 2016. Returning to the stock market in 2018 as a company that could sell servers, storage, networking, financing and service together. HP's path: a run of CEOs, the Autonomy write-down, and the 2015 split into HP Inc and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. In the quarter ending July 2026: Dell sold $16.1 billion of AI servers, more than the $14.6 billion its whole PC business brought in. Dell's revenue reached $47 billion, up 58%, with a $95 billion backlog. HPE posted a record $12.2 billion quarter. The film also looks at what going private really bought Dell, why size mattered in this boom, and why a backlog is still a promise, not cash. Chapters 0:00 A garage, a crane and a server rack 0:51 Same wall, opposite bets 1:28 The PC business in trouble 2:26 Dell's bet: going private 3:37 HP's bet: splitting in two 4:27 Then came the AI boom 6:14 The verdict 7:01 This story isn't finished 7:58 Next time on Tech history Made with KitCut, the Claude video maker: https://kitcut.ai/i/jfgjejw?c=yt