Home » Careers » Business Skills » Mergers and acquisitions in November

Mergers and acquisitions in November

Avatar photoby Ben Rossi

Given the scale of recent acquisitions, such as those by Oracle and eBay, it is worth looking at how some past mega-mergers worked out.

One example is i2 TECHNOLOGIES’ $9.3 billion purchase of Aspect Development in 2000. It was the largest ever software merger at a time when analysts were predicting that, by 2003, $1.5 trillion worth of business would be done via B2B hubs. Enthusiasm for e-marketplaces dwindled and in November 2005, i2 finally sold its content and data services division (of which Aspect’s software was a key element) to manufacturing and engineering specialist IHS for just $30 million.

Such experiences might explain why the vast majority of today’s acquisitions are small, tactical deals that fill gaps in larger vendors’ portfolios.

MICROSOFT snapped up two niche vendors: MEDIA-STREAMS.COM, which builds SIP-based Internet telephony ‘softphones’ to enrich its Live Communications Server collaboration product; and FOLDERSHARE, whose peer-to-peer file sharing and synchronisation software will be added to the Windows Live online consumer service.

In a similar mood for plugging gaps, SAP paid around $100 million for KHIMETRICS which sells price optimisation and demand intelligence software. Building on its September purchase of point-of-sale software vendor Triversity, SAP is now better positioned in the retail market after losing out to ORACLE on retail specialist Retek.

Oracle’s own purchases were relatively modest. User provisioning vendor THOR TECHNOLOGIES and virtual directory supplier OCTETSTRING boost its identity and access management (IAM) portfolio to integrate with its business applications, database and applications server.

   
 
Mergers and acquisitions in November
Acquirer   Activity   HQ   Target   Activity   HQ   Price  
BakBone Software Back-up software US Constant Data Replication &clustering s/w US $5.5m
Business Objects Business intelligence s/w France Medience Information integration s/w France n/a
Cisco Systems Networking systems US Scientific-Atlanta TV set top boxes US $6.9bn
Cisco Systems Networking systems US Digital Fairway IP telephony provisioning Canada $15.2m
Citrix Systems Server applications s/w US Teros Internet security s/w US n/a
Click Commerce Channel relationship mgmt s/w US Requisite Technology Master data mgmt s/w US $23.3m
EMC Storage &document systems US Captiva Software Imaging s/w US $270m
EMC Storage &document systems US Acartus Fixed content access s/w US n/a
Francisco Partners Investment company US FrontRange CRM s/w US $200m
Garnett &Helfrich Venture funding US CAs Ingres Division Database s/w US n/a
Golden Gate Capital Investment company US Geac Computer Business applications s/w Canada $1.0bn
IBM Systems, s/w &IT services US Collation IT services management s/w US n/a
IBM Systems, s/w &IT services US iPhrase Systems Customer services search s/w US n/a
IBM Systems, s/w &IT services US DataPower Technology XML middleware US n/a
IHS Inc Decision support svcs US i2s Content &Data Svcs div Component/supplier mgmt s/w US $30m
Juniper Networks Networking systems US Funk Software Network security s/w US $122m
Kewill Systems Supply/demand chain mgmt s/w UK Interchain Holding Supply chain s/w Holland E11.2m
LM Ericsson Telefon Telecoms svcs Sweden Marconi Telecoms products UK £1.2bn
Macromedia Application dev tools US Mobile Innovation Mobile integration s/w US n/a
MessageLabs Messaging mgmt svcs US Omnipod Internet messaging security s/w US n/a
Metastorm Business process mgmt s/w US CommerceQuest Business process management s/w US n/a
Microsoft Application &systems s/w US FolderShare File management s/w US n/a
Microsoft Application &systems s/w US Media-streams.com VoIP s/w Swiss n/a
Nokia Mobile telecoms US Intellisync Wireless messaging/mobile s/w US $430m
Oracle Database &appln dev s/w US Thor Technologies Security management s/w US n/a
Oracle Database &appln dev s/w US OctetString Identity/access management s/w US n/a
QLogic Storage networking products US Troika Networks Storage virtualisation products US $36.5m
RedPrairie Supply chain &logistics s/w US RangeGate Mobile Solutions Warehouse/store mgmt s/w UK n/a
Sage Group Business applications s/w UK Adonix Business applications s/w France £78.4m
SAP Business applications s/w Germany Khimetrics Customer demand mgmt s/w US n/a
SonicWall Security s/w US Lasso Logic/enKoo Back-up/remote access s/w US n/a
TeleCity Data centre &managed svcs UK Redbus Interhouse Data centre &managed svcs UK £58.9m
Tibco Process mgmt &integration s/w US Velosel Master data mgmt s/w US n/a
 
   

Avatar photo

Ben Rossi

Ben was Vitesse Media's editorial director, leading content creation and editorial strategy across all Vitesse products, including its market-leading B2B and consumer magazines, websites, research and...

Related Topics

Related Stories

Business Skills

Skills gap – 28% of the UK workforce is underqualified

Jobbio's Aoibhinn McBride explains why the skills gap is the real problem in the technology hiring landscape

Business Skills

6 things you can do to make your IT staff happier

Over 80% of knowledge workers say they’re unhappy at work. Three quarters of staff say they’d move jobs to be happier at work. Here are 6 ways to make your staff feel better about the daily grind

Business Skills

How to become a software engineer

Britain has around two million technology jobs left unfilled, yet even a junior developer can earn £39,000 a year. We explain how a novice can become a software engineer

AI & Machine Learning

How AI specialists will be the future of business

With artificial intelligence capabilities continuing to grow, specialists dedicated to maintaining AI systems will prove crucial to business success, says Dr. Stefan Sigg