戴爾落選《財富》美國500強 從51位跌落雲端內幕
Dell Inc. is no longer a Fortune 500 company, despite ranking #51 last year and #44 in 2012. In fact, it has been in the mix for well over a decade before this year’s fall from rankings grace.
戴爾公司(Dell Inc)2012年在《財富》美國500強排名第44位,去年排名為第51位,然而今年它卻跌出了榜單。事實上,這家公司在今年落榜之前已經連續十多年上榜。So, what happened?
那麼,到底發生了什麼事?Dell was taken private last October by company founder Michael Dell and private equity firm Silver Lake in a contentious $25 billion transaction. Often such private companies still can qualify for the Fortune 500 — which largely relies on annual revenue data — because their debt is publicly-traded and, as such, the companies release financial performance.
去年10月,戴爾公司創始人邁克爾o戴爾和私募股權投資公司銀湖投資集團(Silver Lake)完成了備受爭議的 250億美元戴爾私有化交易。通常,這樣的私營企業仍然有資格躋身財富500強(上榜的主要依據是每年的營收數據)因為他們的債務公開交易,進而也會公佈財務業績。
But as we reported last month, Dell structured its bonds by using something called Rule 144a for-life, a technique that is growing in popularity among private equity-backed companies(despite creating some short-term liquidity constraints for bondholders). In terms of the Fortune 500, this means that Dell needn’t publicly-disclose its financials. Instead, bondholders, prospective bondholders and certain analysts are provided quarterly data via conference calls and an online data room, but only on a confidential basis.
但是,正如我們在上個月所報道的,戴爾公司通過144a終身規則(Rule 144a for-life)進行了債券結構化,這項規則在私募股權基金支持的公司中越來越受到歡迎(儘管它對債券持有人設置了一些短期的流動性約束)。就《財富》美國500強方面而言,這意味着戴爾公司無須公開披露自己的財務狀況。相反,戴爾公司通過電話會議和在線數據室向債券持有人、未來債券持有人和某些分析師發佈季度數據,但前提是對外保密。Fortune did reach out to Dell when putting together the Fortune 500, but was rebuffed.
《財富》雜誌(Fortune)在編輯財富500強榜單時曾經試圖與戴爾公司進行溝通,但是遭到了回絕。Dell has enough debt that some of its financials likely will leak at some point, but it hasn’t happened yet. And, without official figures, it’s out.
戴爾公司擁有龐大的債務,因此它可能會在某些時候公佈一些財務數據,但是現在還沒有。由於沒有獲得官方數據,戴爾沒能進入本年度的財富500強。