After months of wrangling and tough negotiating, Dell Inc. is finally going private.
The computer company said on Tuesday that its $24.9 billion sale to its founder, Michael S. Dell, and the investment firm Silver Lake has closed. The closing comes more than a month after shareholders approved the deal and means that Dell shares will be delisted at the end of the day.
It also follows a bruising multimonth fight between Mr. Dell and the activist investor Carl C. Icahn, who bitterly argued that the takeover price was far too low. Ultimately, Mr. Dell and Silver Lake agreed to raise their bid slightly to $13.88 a share in cash.
Now will come the hard work of reviving a onetime pioneer of the computer industry, which has been battered by dropping sales of personal computers and the rise of mobile devices like smartphones and the iPad.
Mr. Dell has said that he believes the company already has the foundation for a new strategy: focusing on services for business customers. What comes next is extending that move in private, away from the glare of research analysts and public investors.
“Today, Dell enters an exciting new chapter as a private enterprise,†Mr. Dell said in a statement. “Our 110,000 team members worldwide are 100 percent focused on our customers and aggressively executing our long-term strategy for their benefit.â€
Shares in Dell were roughly flat in midday trading at $13.86.
