We employ slightly more than 16,000 employees worldwide, with nearly 12,000 of them located in the Greater Austin area. Mr. Chairman, my experience with Dell has shown me that the most powerful competitive force in our industry is evolving customer demand and the companies that are successful are those that are able to stay closest to customer needs. The trend to standardization in both hardware and software within our business has been market-driven. Standardization has been one of the reasons that Dell has been able to grow rapidly alongside much older and more established companies such as IBM and Hewlett Packard. Standards simplify the computing environment and establish a common hardware and software platform to make it easier for systems to work together and to exchange information.
Standards also simplify product development and service, thereby reducing our costs.
Just as important, standards have clarified computing technology for average users. By driving overall costs down, standards also have increased the penetration of computers into the consumer and business mainstream. We believe the trend to standardization has helped both Dell and our customers. I thank the Chairman and the Committee for the opportunity to share these observations with you. I would be happy to answer any questions.