A tidal shift is taking place at the world's biggest personal computer maker Dell, though if you blinked you might miss it. Twenty years since founding the first genuine "build to order" PC firm from a room in his Texas home, company founder Michael Dell is relinquishing his position as chief executive officer.

The anointed heir to the top job, Dell's president and chief operating officer Kevin Rollins, takes over on July 16th. The operational brain behind Dell's hugely successful direct sales model, Mr Rollins will now take overall responsibility for making sure the firm stays ahead of the chasing pack.

But if he is inwardly even a little nervous about taking over as boss, he doesn't show it.

"I am absolutely excited," says Mr Rollins, a one-time management consultant who, at 51, has spent much of the last decade bringing his operational skills to bear on Mr Dell's grand entrepreneurial vision.

But if the firm's 4,300 Irish staff were to fear changes emanating from Dell's Texas HQ, they would be mistaken.

Throughout his first interview with an Irish newspaper since becoming chief executive-designate in March, Mr Rollins stresses the dual themes of continuity and stability and refuses to lay out any grand new strategy.

"It is not really going to be much of a change. Both of us will continue to run the company together, the titles have changed but you will still see Michael as much as you ever have." To the delight of the firm's shareholders Mr Dell (39) will continue to be involved in the day-to-day operations of Dell and retain the title of chairman.

Indeed, many analysts believe the reshuffle has more to do with posterity than reflecting any real change in Dell's senior management.

"It merely formalises the role he has held for several years," says Gartner analyst John Enck.

"As Dell's COO, Rollins has been responsible for company strategy and operations."

Dell has coined a phrase for its bipolar approach to management, "two-in-a-box management". And this approach is being applied in other parts of Dell's business, such as product development and procurement.

"It is a model that we use but we use it sparingly. It does not work everywhere because you have to have people who have their egos in check to pull it off," says Mr Rollins, whose relationship with Mr Dell is so close they share an open plan office with only a glass divider at company headquarters in Austin, Texas.

Ensuring a peaceful succession to the top job is good news for Dell shareholders, customers and staff. There is little reason for dramatic change at the firm. Successfully riding out a three-year downturn in the computer business, Dell remains on target to achieve its ambitious goal of generating $60 billion (€49.6 billion)revenue by its 2007 fiscal year. This month it reported another successive quarterly increase in profits to 28 cents a share, up from 23 cents per share at the same period last year. Revenues came in at $11.5 billion, up from $9.5 billion in the same period of 2003.

And as one Dell employee commented on the fringes of a London press conference this week, "if it ain't broken, why fix it?" "We are moving from that highly energetic but erratic teenager mode into a more mature adult business but we don't intend to slow the company down," says Mr Rollins. "There are no big changes ahead because if I could see an area that we could do better I would have done it already." The one area where Dell is focusing greater attention now is its own corporate culture, he says.

Dell has introduced an initiative called "The soul of Dell". Essentially a mission statement for employees to follow, the programme aims to build an honest and dynamic corporate culture. It also recently introduced an ethics hotline, which enables staff to anonymously inform an independent agency contracted by the firm about anything that is going wrong in the company.

"We want every employee to be responsible and every pair of eyes possible to be focused on anything we can do better. We reward people for bringing those issues forward, either improvements to our business or issues that are inappropriate," he says.

Despite recently launching new products in the consumer electronics market, Mr Rollins says the firm's core focus will remain on the enterprise sector. Building on its partnership with fellow technology titan EMC, Dell launched a new very low-cost network storage product this week for small and medium-sized businesses.

Dell has made a habit of entering new markets and doing it cheaper and often better than the existing players. The company's direct internet and telephone sales model, just-in-time manufacturing techniques and logistics expertise enables the firm to undercut rivals and create a "Dell effect" in the sectors it enters.

Despite facing tougher competition in recent months, Mr Rollins says that few of the big players in the computer business are making money. And with Dell rapidly diversifying from a pure PC maker into a range of other computer peripherals there are few places for the likes of HP, IBM and Sun to hide.

He cites the example of the printer business, where Dell claims to have won 10 per cent of the US market in a year. "Customers have been charged too much for too long - so it is a ripe example waiting to see the Dell effect." Despite risks in the Middle East, Mr Rollins remains upbeat on the global economy.

"I think the global economy is clearly on the mend led by a US recovery. And as the US increases capital spending Europe will benefit too, while Asia has always been doing quite well." The improved economy has taken some heat off the debate on off-shoring in the US, which had prompted some politicians to propose penalties on firms moving jobs overseas, says Mr Rollins, who serves on the US Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiation.

Oil is a concern, although it is cheaper now than 10 years ago when inflation is taken into account. It is more a "stability of mindset" issue due to the war in Iraq that is a concern, says Mr Rollins.

This upbeat assessment of the economy should be good news for Dell's Irish operations, a manufacturing plant in Limerick and a sales and support centre in Bray. But Mr Rollins, who once played the violin for Dell's Irish staff, says there is no big new investment planned for Ireland.

"Ireland has its own challenges, like many other developed countries, in that you have Asian countries now - China, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia - that are very competitive," says Mr Rollins, who gave the clearest signal yet that Dell will in the future build a new manufacturing plant in eastern Europe.

"We are not looking to close or change our Irish operations, which have been such a success for us. But at some point we may build a facility to handle additional demand in eastern Europe," says Mr Rollins, who stresses that the idea is not yet on the drawing board.

But at just 51 years of age, Mr Rollins will be the chief executive to lead Dell's expansion into eastern Europe and abroad. About 70 per cent of the firm's sales are currently made in the US, which is one statistic Mr Rollins want to change.

Following on from Mr Dell is a hard act to follow, but Mr Rollins says he has no intentions of retiring.