Seems like the company which claimed it was the Dot in the .com could not muster enough interest or convince IBM to sign on the dotted line. IBM had reportedly made a $9.40 offer to buy Sun and get its hand on the customer base, MySQL, Java, OpenOffice and other properties which Sun had not managed to capitalize on. But I think this is just another pose in the mating dance, like the one going on between Microsoft and Yahoo.
Seems like the executives from Sun were not in this planet the whole of last year when Microsoft-Yahoo episode broke. Yahoo rejected the $44 offer from Microsoft as too low only to see its stock price going down to single digits. Now the slide in Sun has begun. Sun would do well to not repeat the Yahoo mistake.
If you look at the timing of the deal, it was time either IBM or HP made an offer to buy Sun as the company by itself had not gotten out of the dotcom burst it went through. Change in CEO, $700M investment by KKR and a new ticker symbol (JAVA) could not do the trick.
IBM was the logical choice to acquire Sun given the presence IBM has in both Java and Open Source arena. IBM also has a richer R&D budget to spend on Open Solaris if it decides to continue spending.
Sun for its part, has lost all the luster of a one-time Silicon Valley and Nasdaq shining star. Missing the boat on capitalizing on the very technology it created and now powering more than half the applications and websites around the world – Java. Seeing companies like BEA, IBM make more money building Application Servers, Middleware focussed on java gives a new meaning to “eating someone else’s lunch”. Multiple attempts to gain some traction in the Application Server, Developer Tools have not helped its cause.
It is so ironic, that technology companies end up falling into the arms of the very companies whom they once derided.
- Peoplesoft, Seibel getting acquired by Oracle. (I think Salesforce will one day end up in Redwood Shores as well)
- Yahoo courting (and don’t pretend you are not) Microsoft.
- And now Sun courting IBM.
And going by the trend in the acquired companies above do we see the return of Scott McNealy, as the CEO, albeit just to sell the company? No he would’nt. He hated IBM did’nt he?
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