HP today offered $24 per share, or $1.6 billion in cash, to acquire high-end data storage hardware and software provider 3PAR, launching a bidding war against HP rival Dell, which just last week offered to buy 3PAR for $18 per share.
Today’s offer represents a move to boost HP’s ability to sell high-end storage to end customers and service providers that are building public and private cloud computing environments. 3PAR’s virtualized and multi-tenant storage offerings will allow HP to sell “into markets where today we are not selling our products,” said Dave Donatelli, HP executive vice president and general manager for Enterprise Servers, Storage, and Networking (ESS), in a Webcast presentation following the announcement of the proposed acquisition.
3PAR had not responded to HP’s offer by press time. HP described its proposal as free of financing contingencies. The offer has already been approved by HP’s board.
“Once approved by 3PAR’s board, HP expects the transaction to close by the end of the calendar year,” HP said in a prepared statement.