Battery Recall Could Cost Dell About $246 Million

The turmoil reached a crescendo last week after several months of bad publicity that began when a Dell notebook was caught on camera bursting into flames during a business conference in Japan earlier this year. The photo of that incident circulated virus-like throughout the Internet, leading to a spate of "me too" reports from other Dell customers who said their notebooks also caught fire.

Last month, a source close to Dell shared materials with CRN showing that Dell executives had been presented with evidence, through early last year, that scores of its notebooks had severe overheating problems—including several that appeared burned or scorched. The areas of overheating, according to photographs, weren't limited to areas containing the battery but also included scorched Ethernet ports, melted keyboards and a burned trackpad.

A Sony spokesman told CRN that company executives would not be made available to discuss the battery fiasco. However, the spokesman said that New York-based Sony currently was speaking to other vendors that use Sony's battery cells to determine whether similar problems existed for Dell rivals, too.

As of late last week, no such other vendors emerged.

"It's definitely a feather in my cap when something like this happens to Dell," said Jeff Salmeri, president of Computer Escape, a solution provider in Randolph, Mass. "That's something we can use to our benefit, especially this time of year, when notebook sales are up with kids going back to school."

Salmeri said he has seen an increase in sales of his own whitebooks to college students looking for higher-quality products. "It's nice to see what we've been telling customers all along has come to fruition," he said. "Batteries on fire and expensive notebooks are good for me."

Tim DeKorne, business manager at system builder One Second Computers and Communications, Dover, N.H., pumped his fist in exultation after someone mentioned the Dell battery recall. "We're in competition with Dell," he said. "Unless you want to join them, this is good news."

STEVEN BURKE & SCOTT CAMPBELL contributed to this report.