In a deal that would significantly bolster IBM's position as the world's largest server maker, the Wall Street Journal is reporting this morning that IBM is willing to pay $6.5BN in cash to acquire Sun Microsystems.
"It is unclear whether the negotiations will result in a transaction, but if the deal does go through, IBM is likely to pay at least $6.5 billion in cash to acquire Sun, the people said. That would translate into a premium of about 100% over Sun's closing price Tuesday of $4.97 a share on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
Any transaction would strengthen IBM's position against Hewlett-Packard Co., the largest company in the information technology industry. It could be the largest acquisition in IBM's history, surpassing the acquisition of Cognos Inc. last year."
The Journal reporters are also careful to add a disclaimer: "People familiar with the matter cautioned that while talks are under way, a transaction might not occur."
Both IBM and Sun are closely involved in SYS-CON's upcoming 2nd International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo, being held March 30-April 1, 2009, in New York City.
Dr Kristof Kloeckner, CTO of Enterprise Initiatives and VP of Cloud Computing Platforms, IBM Software Group, is presenting a keynote address on March 30 in which he will review the conditions under which cloud computing can deliver its promise of flexibility and cost savings in the delivery of IT services to the enterprise.
Dr Kloeckner will discuss the importance of dynamic infrastructures and service management for both public and private clouds, cloud service life cycles, and integration between public clouds and enterprise services. He will also talk about the standards required for interoperability between clouds and application scenarios that demonstrate the use of cloud computing in an enterprise context for a smarter planet.
Then the following day, April 1st, Sun's Sr. VP of Cloud Computing, David Douglas, will be keynoting on how enterprise IT operations can take advantage of the emerging world of multiple clouds to achieve the cost and flexibility advantages that cloud computing allows while maintaining control of their IT infrastructure.
They are joined in the event's keynote lineup of major industry thought leaders by Dr Werner Vogels, VP & CTO of Amazon.com.
Ajay Anand - Director of Grid Computing, Yahoo!
You can follow the Event - and those planning to attend - by connecting to the Event on LinkedIn, or following it on Twitter.
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