IBM withdraws $7b bid for Sun Microsystems

IBM withdraws $7b bid for Sun Microsystems

Andrew Lyle on 06 April 2009 - 13:58 · 13 comments & 3290 views

Advertisement (Why?)

Earlier Neowin had reported that IBM was interested in purchasing Sun Microsystems for $7 billion in a plan to help move into the software market. The original plan to purchase the company for $10 - $11 a share, dropped to just $9.40 a share.

IBM later retracted its bid to purchase Sun Microsystems stating the companies could not come to an agreement. The Times reported that the price change after IBM's lawyers discovered that Sun's payments to senior employees were higher than anticipated. Shares plummeted for Sun Microsystems today after IBM backed out from the purchase of the company. The trades dropped by $2.19 (26%) to just $6.30 ahead of the markets opening.

Possible interest could be revisited in the future, much like Microsoft continues to revisit the idea of purchasing Yahoo. No discussions were left if IBM would ever reconsider purchasing Sun Microsystems, but now with the company's value lower than last week, talks could surface soon.

About the Author

Full name: Andrew Lyle
User name: Andrew Lyle
Contact: via forum PM
Submissions: View All
More: View Bio New!

Post a comment · Send to friend Comments · There are 13 additional comments

(4 replies) #1 cabron on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:06

I can't believe that a company like SUN with a market that is almost gone, did not accept the offer from IBM. They are totally crazy.

#1.1 The Stylish Hobo on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:16

Isn't the software sector actually doing better than normal during this recession?

#1.2 lylesback2 on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:17

You got to think, if your company has a strong hold on the market, multi-platform language, with thousands of programmers who know their script language, and a company you built and worked hard on, to be sold for a value that you think is too small, you would be angry too.

A bit of a dumb move by Sun, now their company value just dropped by half, or will be around that mark come markets closing today

#1.3 cabron on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:17

The Stylish Hobo said,

Isn't the software sector actually doing better than normal during this recession?

True, I was referring to their Hardware server business, which is 80% of their business.

#1.4 excalpius on 06 Apr 2009 - 15:08

What value does Sun have anyway? Honestly, they've been as irrelevant as SGI for a very long time now...

(1 reply) #2 Thunderbuck on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:53

There's one other possibility: Oracle may be preparing a competing bid.

Think about it. Sun servers are among the most popular choice for Oracle db's, and putting that hardware in IBM's hands suddenly makes things a little awkward for the big O.

An Oracle/Sun merger might make more sense than an IBM buyout on some levels. For one thing, there's a good chance that IBM might just have to spin off pieces of Sun to make the deal work for regulators.

And in the end, Larry Ellison's ego is just big enough that I'm betting he'd be tickled to beat them out on this.

#2.1 BigBoy on 06 Apr 2009 - 16:01

Thunderbuck said,

There's one other possibility: Oracle may be preparing a competing bid.

Or Cisco...

(3 replies) #3 thealexweb on 06 Apr 2009 - 14:59

Sun won't be going anywhere soon,

#3.1 excalpius on 06 Apr 2009 - 15:09

They've been deader than Julius Caesar since the 90's so it's harder to go any further down. That dinosaur's already extinct.

#3.2 thealexweb on 06 Apr 2009 - 16:15

excalpius said,

They've been deader than Julius Caesar since the 90's so it's harder to go any further down. That dinosaur's already extinct.

If it wasn't for them no OpenOffice, Java, OpenSolaris, etc.

#3.3 GreyWolfSC on 06 Apr 2009 - 19:21

OpenOffice was developed by StarDivision as StarOffice. Sun bought it from them.

(1 reply) #4 TRC on 06 Apr 2009 - 20:33

I love the people talking about Sun like they're dead and worthless. So much ignorance, lol.

#4.1 TaBaScO on 07 Apr 2009 - 00:43

I agree! lol... very ignorant. Solaris isn't going anywhere, Java isn't going anywhere, etc.... Solaris is still one of the best Unix operating systems available, and that's pretty well know in the enterprise market. It's certainly much better than AIX... AIX is garbage in my opinion. I work on both Windows and Solaris servers, and if I can run a given application on Solaris over Windows I'll always pick Solaris. Solaris is much more stable for applications that need high availability and stability.

Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!

Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.

Advertisement (Why?)

Neowin.net

IBM withdraws $7b bid for Sun Microsystems

Share this Article

About the Author

Related news