Kevin Peesker used his lead keynote at Dell Canada’s large customer event in Toronto to address fact and fiction about the approaching EMC acquisition, with the pink fluffy unicorns of myth taking pride of place in his discussion.

TORONTO – Kevin Peesker, Dell Canada’s president, kicked off the fourth annual Dell Power to Do More event at a downtown hotel here, by addressing a topic most of the approximately 600 attendees at the event desperately wanted to know more about — the upcoming Dell-EMC merger.

“In October 2015, we announced we are going to undertake the largest tech acquisition-merger in history, and there have been lots of headlines about this – some of them true, some of them not,” he said. “We will be sharing some information here we haven’t shared publicly before.”

Peesker framed his keynote around the theme of differentiating myth from fact, with the myths epitomized by pink fluffy unicorns colorfully displayed in his slide presentation.

The Fact Peesker emphasized out of the gate was that the consolidation will significantly expand the companies’ combined portfolio, and in a way that enhances rather than duplicates.

“It’s a fact that 92 per cent of customers expect to maintain or increase their spending across the two companies,” Peesker stressed.

Peesker then moved into what he said was commonly-held fiction about the deal.

“One fiction is that the deal might not happen,” he said. “We are absolutely moving forward with the transaction.” He emphasized that key regulatory compliance has been achieved, particularly with the EU and the FTC.

Peesker also called the view that the merger is only designed to drive cost synergies a fiction as well.

“Strong combinations bring complementary products and go-to-market models together and do it with scale,” he said. “This positions us in the fastest growing areas of next-generation IT.”

Peesker also mocked as fiction the theory that the staggering cost of the transaction will mire Dell in so much debt that it won’t be able to fund R&D or other mergers.

“The exact same rumors were made when Dell went private,” he said. “Since then we have added 1700 net-new sales specialists to serve customers in a more intense way. Combining Dell and EMC will bring together tens of thousands of engineers and talent and position us where many companies would like to be in the upper right of Gartners Magic Quadrant, with 22 leaders.”

The final fiction Peesker addressed was that the two companies will operate independently once the combination is complete.

“That’s a pink fluffy unicorn,” Peesker said. “Michael has already announced the next leg of how we go to market and who the new leaders will be. We will have a phenomenal portfolio, building on the capability set Dell offers today.”

Ultimately, the deal will drive Dell’s objective of helping clients become future-ready companies.

“It’s about moving IT organizations from being a cost centre to being a profit centre,” he said “This has been happening over time. The tipping point is completed and we are there.”

Peesker noted that IDC has characterized this as a continuum, with 16 per cent, at the bottom, being current-focused. 32 per cent are future-aware, 33 per cent are future-focused, and 18 per cent future creators, with the latter taking a business driven approach to IT transformation, and representing the ideal point on the spectrum.

“Future creators drive nearly double the revenues and productivity gains compared to current-focused organizations,” he said.