Dell Software
Dell Software was a division of Dell with headquarters in Round Rock, Texas, United States. Dell Software was created merging various acquisitions (mainly Quest Software and Sonicwall) by Dell Inc., the third-largest maker of PCs and now a privately held company, to build out its software offerings for data center and cloud management, information management, mobile workforce management, security and data protection for organizations of all sizes. History. Dell Inc. formed the Dell Software group in February 2012, after a series of 37 acquisitions strengthened the company’s focus on software and services. The new group helped  unify the acquisitions, which included the following companies, among others: On March 5, 2012, John Swainson became president of Dell Software. Previously, Swainson was Senior Advisor to Silver Lake Partners, a global private equity firm. Prior to Silver Lake, he was CEO and director of CA Inc., from early 2005 through 2009. The purpose of forming the new group was to build on Dell’s software capabilities and provide research and organizational support for achieving Michael Dell’s vision of delivering end-to-end IT solutions to customers. On June 20, 2016, Dell Software announced an agreement to be purchased  by private equity firm Francisco Partners and hedge fund manager Elliott Management. On November 1, 2016, the sale of Dell Software to Francisco Partners and Elliott Management was completed and the company relaunched as Quest Software. While legally named Quest Software, it is known in the marketplace as Quest. Quest is an IT software tool provider with a focus on enabling innovation with less administration. Quest products are built from unique IP by in-house engineers, guided by a community of users, and backed by a global support team. Solutions. Dell Software offered end-to-end solutions to address challenges  in several business and technology areas, including six key ones: Data protection software and deduplication appliances offer customized backup, replication and recovery systems for physical, virtual, application and cloud environments. The solutions provide management tools for enterprise backup and recovery, virtual protection, application-specific data protection, and disaster recovery for uninterrupted productivity. They also help organizations prevent intrusions, block malware and gather application intelligence. Endpoint management solutions simplify management of a diverse array of endpoint systems and devices, including desktops, laptops, servers, Chromebooks, mobile devices, virtual workspaces and network-connected non-computing devices. The solutions allow organizations to deploy systems , conduct asset inventory, automate operating system and application patch management, and manage software updates. Identity and access management solutions allow organizations to govern identities, manage privileged accounts, and control access. They help organizations achieve identity, data, and privileged access governance, simplify secure access management for users and groups, and enable control and audit administrative access through secure, automated, policy-based workflows. Information management solutions simplify data access, analysis and management. They integrate with most legacy systems and enable organizations to manage complex and big data, ensure data accuracy, integrate applications and data across on-site and cloud environments, streamline business  intelligence, and automate development and database management tasks. Network security solutions provide intrusion prevention, malware protection, application intelligence and control, real-time traffic visualization, and inspection for Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)–encrypted sessions at the gateway. They also enable organizations to manage, visualize, analyze, audit and report across numerous appliances deployed at remote sites through a centralized console. Windows Server management and migration solutions automate administrative functions for Active Directory, Exchange, Lync, SharePoint, Office 365 and other Microsoft platforms. These solutions enable organizations to migrate, consolidate and restructure mission-critical application environments, customize Windows platforms, and manage IT governance, risk and  compliance of Windows environments.