SAN FRANCISCO — Two years ago, Michael S. Dell succeeded in taking the company that bears his name private, giving him time and flexibility to adapt it to a rapidly changing technology industry.

Now Dell is poised to strike the biggest-ever takeover in the technology industry by buying a fellow company grappling with swift changes: the storage provider EMC.

In striking its deal of more than $60 billion, Dell and its financial backer, the investment firm Silver Lake, are betting that a huge acquisition will help one of the best-known names in the industry keep up with the times.

No longer can a company like Dell thrive simply by making personal computers, the business that its founder began in his dorm room three decades ago. Mr. Dell recognized that when he and Silver Lake took the company private two years ago, with the goal of continuing to move toward corporate computing services away from the glare of the public stock markets.