Mr. Rubinstein? Michael Dell on Line 1, Sir. Shall I Put Him Through to Voicemail?

Is Dell positioning itself to make a large acquisition? It certainly appears that way. The company recently hired mergers-and-acquisitions specialist David Johnson away from IBM (IBM). And yesterday, it sold off $1 billion in bonds. Dell (DELL) already has $9.7 billion in cash reserves on hand, so presumably it needs that extra billion for something beyond the “general corporate purposes” it claims. You know, like acquiring BMC (BMC). Or Symantec (SYMC). Or QLogic (QLGC). Or deduplication outfit CommVault (CVLT).

Or Palm (PALM), to indulge a years-old rumor. Palm is a logical target, isn’t it? Buying the company would place Dell firmly in the smartphone market it has so often expressed interest in. Can’t imagine an overture from Round Rock would go over too will with Palm’s new leadership, though. Surely Jon Rubinstein didn’t accept the CEO seat at Palm with the understanding that he might someday be working for Dell.