Michael is 12:  Michael embarks upon his very first business venture. Fascinated with stamps and commercial opportunities they offer, Michael creates his own stamps auction. He wants to bypass traditional auctioneers, learn more about stamps, and collect a commission in the process. Michael gets a bunch of people in the neighborhood to consign their stamps to him; advertises "Dell's Stamps" in Linn's Stamp Journal; types, with one finger, a twelve-page catalogue and mails it out. He earns $2,000 and learns an early, powerful lesson about rewards of eliminating the middleman. He also learns that if you've got a good idea, it pays to do something about it.

Michael is 16:  Michael gets a summer job selling newspaper subscriptions to The Houston Post and learns the power of market segmentation. The newspaper gave Michael a list of new phone numbers issued by the telephone company and tells him to cold call them. Michael soon notices the pattern, however, based on the feedback he is getting from potential customers during these conversations. There are two kinds of people who almost always buy subscriptions to the Post: people who have just married and people who have just moved into new houses or apartments. Michael hires a couple of his high school buddies to search for such people. He creates a personalized letter for high-potential customers. Michael earned $18,000 that year, more than his school teacher did.

Michael is 18:  Michael, a freshman student at the University of Texas in Austin, applies for a vendor's license and starts selling high-performance computers upgraded by him. He declares he ultimately wants to compete with IBM and registers the company "PC's Limited".

Michael is 19:  Michael incorporates "Dell Computer Corporation" with initial start-up investment of $1,000. He finishes his freshman year and leaves the University to devote himself to the venture, full-time.

Michael is 26:  Michael becomes the youngest CEO of a company ever to earn a ranking on the Fortune 500.