Zone Gadget

Dell’s Mystery ‘Adamo’ Could Be Thinner Than Air

When Apple released the MacBook Air, someone viewed the sleek notebook as an opportunity to make fun of clunky, old Dell on YouTube with a parody ad. But what if Dell is about to have the last laugh in the ultra-light laptop race?

A recent dig through Dell’s trademarks turned up a couple of curiosities – “Adamo” and “Adamo by Dell.”According to the documents, the trademarks cover computer hardware, including possibly desktops and laptops.

The whole “Adamo by Dell” bit sounds rather fancy for a company that lumps all of its computers under just a handful of brands. But, apparently, this computer isn’t your regular Dell computer. It has its own Web site after all, which says the product is coming soon.

Throw Adamo and Dell into a search engine, and you get nothing. Well, make that almost nothing.

A luxury goods publication appears to have some early marketing collateral from Dell for Adamo. “Rumor has it that Dell is coming out with a computer called Adamo that will rival the MacBook Air,” Uptownlife.net writes.

But most telling of all might have been the reaction of Michael Tatelman, Dell’s vice president in charge of consumer sales and marketing, to my question about whether or not Dell had an Air-like product in store. Mr. Tatelman’s mouth gaped open and his eyes darted away from my face.

If looks could reveal product dimensions, then I’d guess that Dell’s going even thinner and lighter than Apple.

After a couple of moments, Mr. Tatleman said, “I think we need to get some iconic products out there, so people associate Dell’s brand with other things.” Namely, that’s goodbye to clunky, and hello to sleek.

A Dell spokesman, Bob Kaufman, said the company would not comment on speculation.

It remains to be seen whether Dell and its manufacturing partners in Asia can come up with something that rivals the aesthetics of Apple’s MacBook Air. It is pretty clear, though, that Dell could beat Apple on price.

“One of the things they could do real differently from Apple would be cheap,” said Roger Kay, president of Endpoint Technologies, an analyst firm. “They could shave $400 off the MacBook Air price pretty easily.”

By NYTimes