This article is more than 1 year old

Dell throws in 3PAR towel

HP pumps fist

Dell has admitted defeat in its attempt to buy 3PAR.

The latest bids for the suddenly most-desired cloud storage product company in the world, 3PAR, were $32/share from Dell, trumped in hours by a $33/share bid from HP. This is more than twice Dell's original bid of $15/share and makes 3PAR worth more than Data Domain when EMC bought it.

Dell will get a $72m bid termination fee from 3PAR. Its last offer contained a clause mentioning a $92m termination fee and a multi-year fixed price contract to resell 3PAR product, which would apply even if 3PAR's ownership changed. Not surprisingly 3PAR management deemed that unacceptable, which was perhaps Dell's intention.

Dave Johnson, Dell's SVP for corporate strategy, said: “We took a measured approach throughout the process and have decided to end these discussions."

It's back to square one for Dell. Quiet satisfaction for EMC, with no 3PAR product threatening its Dell deals, and triumph for HP and David Donatelli, its head of Enterprise Storage, Servers and Networking, who was the public face of HP's bid.

The fallout includes a raft of lawsuits, and the integration of 3PAR product into HP's EVA and XP storage product range... somehow. ®

More about

More about

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like