Dell To Sell iPods, Huge Boost For Apple

by , 2:00 PM EST, October 30th, 2002

Let it not be said that Dell will let anything get in the way of boosting its sales, including selling Apple-made products. News.com is reporting that Dell will begin selling Apple's #1 selling MP3 player, the iPod.

In what could be a huge boost to Apple's bottom line, the world's largest PC maker, and Apple's arch-rival in the education market, is currently selling the iPod through its phone ordering center, something TMO has confirmed. News.com says that the company will be adding the iPod to its online ordering system, as well. From the News.com report:

"Yep, Dell is reselling iPods," Apple said in a statement provided to CNET News.com. "We are delighted to offer our 5GB, 10GB and 20GB iPods for Windows through Dell's direct retail channel. iPod has been a big success to date, and we would like to make it even bigger."

It should be noted that Dell's online phone center told TMO that only the 10 GB and 20 GB were available, though there was some difficulty in pulling up information on the new product. Also, as makes sense, only the Windows version will be offered. This marks the first time that Apple has allowed only the Windows version of the iPod to be offered from a retailer. There is additional information in the full article. You may also be interested in joining the discussion on this issue in the TMO forums.

The Mac Observer Spin:

This is unbelievably good news for Apple. Dell moves a lot of product, and the company *will* sell a lot of iPods for Apple. Apple is clearly looking at the iPod as a pure revenue generator, and not just an opportunity to expose people to Mac products. Considering the economy, we consider this to be a very smart move.

Needham analyst Charles Wolf said he expects Apple to move some 500,000 iPods after the news broke that Apple would be selling iPods through Target (see today's full report on Apple's confirmation of that development). We think it safe to say that that number could well be adjusted higher because of the Dell announcement.