HP wins 3Par battle
02 Sep 2010
Hewlett-Packard today triumphed in the frantic bid battle for data storage technology firm 3Par as rival bidder Dell declined to raise its last offer and ended talks.
Dell's decision came after it was outbid for the fourth time by HP, which this morning offered $33 per share for the loss making data storage group, valuing it at about $2.1bn.
HP's latest offer is more than 80% higher than the original $18 per share offered by Dell on 16 August and more than three times the market price before Dell made its move.
The fierce auction between the two PC makers underlines the increasing importance of cloud computing, where software, data storage and other services to are supplied over the internet, rather than being based on a computer or servers.
3Par claims its storage systems can cut storage administration costs by up to 90% and infrastructure costs by up to three-quarters.
Dell, which had an offer of $32 per share accepted by the 3Par board before being outbid again, will receive a $72m break fee as compensation.
