account

For the first time since Dell admitted that some of its accountants had been cooking the books to meet quarterly numbers, company founder Michael Dell spoke publicly about the scandal.

At the Citigroup Technology Conference in New York City on Wednesday, Dell said he had no part in the fudged numbers and no idea what the accounting department was up to between 2003 and 2006.

"I was not involved in or aware of any of the accounting irregularities. And certainly I'm not proud of what occurred at our company, but I'm proud of the company overall," … Read more

I'm a sucker for password tools. Since signing on with Webware late last year, I've since amassed a collection of site log-ins the size of a pulp romance novel, and despite my youthful brain, remembering all of them is clearly impossible. A solution I've been using for some months is Roboform, which is a small piece of software that will let you keep your user names and passwords safely tucked away, combined with a browser plug-in that will automatically log you in to each site. This morning I've been playing around with a new feature from … Read more

This article was updated at 2:45 p.m. PDT.

Dell concluded an internal investigation into its accounting procedures Thursday and found that three years' worth of quarterly earnings statements were improperly adjusted, and senior executives knew about it.

Which executives knew isn't clear yet. A Dell representative said the company is "taking responsibility as a team" and isn't naming names.

According to a statement released by the company, the investigation yielded evidence that "certain adjustments appear to have been motivated by the objective of attaining financial targets," and usually took place at the … Read more

At the core of any successful open source business is support. However much technology companies (open source or proprietary) may want to escape the need to actually support the products they ship, they can't. Customers love you until something goes wrong. Whether they love you afterwards depends on the quality of a vendor's support.

In Red Hat's case, support plays a central role in the company's business model and in its high ranking with customers. Brent Fox plays a central role in Red Hat's organization, helping to ensure the continued happiness of some of Red Hat's biggest customers. It's one of those jobs that doesn't get the attention it deserves...until something goes wrong.

The Open Road caught up with Brent to discover how support at Red Hat supports its customers, and how its model differs from that of other vendors.

Name, company, title, and what you actually do

Brent Fox, manager, Global Support Services, Red Hat. I am the manager for the customer Technical Account Management (TAM) team for North America, which is responsible for the technical relationship between Red Hat and some of our largest customers. TAMs act as the advocate inside Red Hat for the accounts with which they work. Prior to that, I was a programmer on the operating system development team from 2000-2004.… Read more

Expensr is another lightweight, Web-based finance tracking site. Like several other sites we've covered recently, this one lets you enter in your income and expenses, and then gives you data about your money.

Expensr's special sauce is that it lets you compare your financial picture to other people who are like you, based on tags. For example, say you tag yourself "married," "San Francisco," and "lawyer." Then you can see how much other married SF lawyers are spending on rent, and if you're living at a level above or below your … Read more

Dell's failure to file a timely earnings report has again earned it notification of possible delisting from the Nasdaq.

It's the fourth such deadline Dell has missed while in the midst of SEC and internal investigations into its accounting practices, including three quarterly reports and its 2006 annual report. The latest deadline passed on May 4, at which time Dell says it notified the Nasdaq Listing and Hearing Review Council of the finding of its own audit committee. In March, Dell announced that its internal investigation yielded what it termed "evidence of misconduct," which could result … Read more

In the midst of a federal investigation into its accounting practices, Dell has appointed a new chief accounting officer, Thomas Sweet.

Sweet, formerly Dell's vice president of finance for the public sector, succeeds Joan Hooper in the role. Hooper's new title is vice president of finance for the Americas region.

A Dell representative called Hooper's new assignment part of the company's rotation of executives and a "restructuring of its global finance leadership team," and would not comment on whether the move is related to the current Securities and Exchange Commission investigation into the company'… Read more

Another government agency is taking interest in Research In Motion's accounting practices.

Following its own internal review of the company's stock options awarded to employees, RIM said Wednesday that it has "had contact with the office of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York upon learning that the U.S. Attorney's office is reviewing the company's stock option grants." RIM says it plans to cooperate with any requests for information.

Earlier this month, RIM announced the Securities and Exchange Commission's informal review of the company's accounting practices had … Read more