By Kimberly Chin 



  Shares of Dell Technologies Inc. rose nearly 7% after hours Wednesday to $56.50 after the company said it is considering a potential spinoff of its 81% equity ownership interest in VMWare Inc. 


  Dell said it is looking at various options, including maintaining its current ownership structure in VMWare as is. 


  A potential spinoff wouldn't occur before September 2021, the company said. 


  The Wall Street Journal reported in June that Dell was examining options including a spinoff in its stake in the cloud-software giant. 


  VMWare's shares rose 3% in after-hours trading to $143.85 following the news. 


  Write to Kimberly Chin at kimberly.chin@wsj.com