General Motors bought the Texas outfit in 1984 and Perot bailed out two years later (and founded rival Perot Systems, which he still runs).

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For example, Dell bought Perot Systems, Force10 Networks, Wyse and SonicWall.

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The acquisition will help Xerox move into outsourcing, data management and consulting and follows on the heels of last week's merger announcement between and Perot Systems.

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Go even further back and Ross Perot, founder of Electronic Data Systems and Perot Systems, unsuccessfully ran for U.S. president as a third-party candidate in 1992 and 1996.

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However, considering the huge premium DELL paid for Perot Systems and the apparent lack of leverage it has yet to realize, that will be a long and bumpy road.

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This is an important sector as it represents higher margin sales than their hardware products, and it suggests the company is seeing the benefits of its recent acquisition of Perot Systems.

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After cleaning up its accounting scandals, Dell next decided to enter other businesses like providing turnkey software packages to major corporations, copying the approach of major tech firms like IBM, by buying Perot systems.

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People who scoff about working virtually remind me of those who laughed at Electronic Data Systems when Ross Perot started talking about outsourcing in 1962.

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