Arik Hesseldahl

Recent Posts by Arik Hesseldahl

Carl Icahn Denied in Bid to Upend Dell Buyout Vote

Carl Icahn, the activist investor, can’t seem to get a break from the Delaware Chancery Court.

A judge in that court turned away Icahn’s petition asking it to intervene and stop a buyout vote scheduled for Sept. 12. That means that the vote, complete with its revised rules, will go on as scheduled. The Wall Street Journal has a closer look at the decision itself here.

Meanwhile, Dell notified shareholders via a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that its regular annual meeting has been scheduled for Oct. 17. The date had been a point of contention for Icahn, who had sought to force Dell to hold the annual meeting on the same date as the special shareholder meeting during which votes on the buyout will be tallied.

Either way, Icahn and his partner in opposing the deal, Southeastern Asset Management, say they will continue to run their own slate of directors and continue to fight for control of the company at the annual meeting in October. In another filing with the SEC, Icahn and Southeastern renominated the slate of directors they first put up on May 17.

CEO and founder Michael Dell and the private equity firm Silver Lake have offered about $25 billion to buy the company out. Icahn and several other large shareholders have argued that their offer undervalues the company. They have proposed a strategic recapitalization that would see 72 percent of shareholders bought out at $14 a share, and leave the remaining shares trading publicly. Shareholders would also receive a special dividend and receive warrants for the purchase for Dell shares at a later date.

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The problem with the Billionaire Savior phase of the newspaper collapse has always been that billionaires don’t tend to like the kind of authority-questioning journalism that upsets the status quo.

— Ryan Chittum, writing in the Columbia Journalism Review about the promise of Pierre Omidyar’s new media venture with Glenn Greenwald