Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster on Tuesday ruled that Michael Dell and the private equity firm Silver Lake underpaid investors by approximately 28 percent in the $24.4 billion going-private merger of Dell Inc. in 2013.
In a 114-page opinion, Laster ruled Silver Lake should have paid $17.62 per share to acquire the computer company, based on a discounted cash flow analysis. Instead, the technology investing firm bought Dell for $13.75 after a back-and-forth sales process in which it twice sweetened the pot for dissenting stockholders.
