Oldest Round Rock Resident's Birthday Wish: Meeting Michael Dell

ROUND ROCK, TX — All that Pete Peterson — the city of Round Rock's oldest resident — wants for his 103rd birthday is to meet Dell CEO Michael Dell, and he's not afraid to let everyone know it.

"I love him," Peterson says simply in a Facebook video making the rounds. Dell is widely admired for his business acumen, founding a business as a wunderkind at UT-Austin that has now grown into a multibillion-dollar high tech empire. But it's the titan's philanthropy through theMichael & Susan Dell Foundation that Peterson admires the most.

Among the areas benefiting from the Dells' largesse are natural disaster victims, students securing scholarships and low-income families achieve financial stability.

In the widely viewed video of Peterson expressing his fervent wish, the centenarian said he'd drop to his knees in gratitude upon meeting Dell, to thank him for his philanthropy. In the next breath, he acknowledges it might be challenging to genuflect in such a fashion given his advanced age, "...but I will try," he said.

Dell has had a storied career, launching his career in business while a freshman pre-med student at the University of Texas at Austin selling upgrade kits for personal computers. By the age of 27, he had become the youngest CEO of a company ranked in Fortune magazine's list of the top 500 corporations. In October 2015, Dell Inc. announced its purchase of EMC Corporation in a $67 billion transaction dubbed by industry watchers as the highest-valued tech acquisition in history.

But equally admirable is the philanthropic work he and his wife run, with a number of ambitious goals outlined on the foundation's website:

• "Each year, we will create opportunities for over 3 million low-income students globally to attend high-quality schools."
• "Each year, we will support over 500,000 classrooms globally with high-quality tools, technology, and resources to deliver effective instruction."
• "Each year, we will help over 350,000 low-income students globally earn university degrees."
• "Each year, we will provide new career and job opportunities for over 250,000 low-income young adults globally."
• "Each year, we will improve the financial stability of over 3 million low-income families globally by creating access to responsible financial services."
• "Each year, we will improve the health and wellness of over 1 million children and their families across the United States."
• "Each year, we will provide pathways out of poverty for over 150,000 low-income families in Central Texas."

It's certainly not hard to understand why Peterson wants to meet Dell and say thanks. Let's hope he gets to meet him soon!