Dell Technologies Inc has announced a significant rebranding of its PCs, moving away from decades-old product names like "XPS" and "Inspiron" in favour of simplified branding centred around the name Dell. This change, revealed ahead of CES 2025, aims to make the company's products easier to remember and recognise, similar to the naming conventions used by Apple Inc.

Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke explained, "Customers really prefer names that are easy to remember and easy to pronounce. Buyers shouldn't have to spend time 'figuring out our nomenclature, which at times has been a bit confusing.'"

In an effort to stimulate demand, Dell will divide its new PCs into three tiers: Dell, Dell Pro, and Dell Pro Max. The decision follows years of sluggish PC sales since the pandemic buying surge, with Dell and its competitors like HP Inc. and Lenovo Group Ltd. exploring strategies such as AI-optimised systems and the upcoming end-of-support for Windows 10 as incentives for upgrades.

The new branding scheme immediately sparked comparisons with Apple's device naming conventions. One attendee at the press briefing asked, "Why didn't you choose something original, because you essentially have Apple's branding here?" While some critics pointed out the similarities to Apple's "Pro" and "Pro Max" labels, Dell executives defended the choice, stating that "nobody owns words like 'pro' or 'max,'" and that the decision was based on extensive customer research.

Kevin Terwilliger, Vice President of Dell's PC business, explained that the company is anchoring its products to a simple, unified brand name for clarity and consistency, much like Apple's approach.

Notably, Alienware, the gaming-focused brand Dell acquired in 2006, will retain its current naming structure and is not part of the rebranding effort. Many of the new Dell-branded PCs will also include neural processing units designed for artificial intelligence tasks.

CEO Michael Dell also emphasised the opportunity in the ageing global PC market, stating, "There's an install base of 1.5 billion PCs — and it's aging — and those PCs will need to be replaced with the AI innovation." He added that the new naming scheme would "make it easier for our customers to do business with us."

Bloomberg