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It’s over. Dell has said it will not raise it’s offer any more.

Dell Inc. says it will not match Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard’s offer to pay $33 per share for 3Par Inc., or about $2.07 billion.

Probably will write more later 🙂 Been a busy morning.

So apparently the news is official, 3PAR has determined the new $33/share bid is superior. Dell seems to be conceding defeat at this point. Apparently as part of Dell’s recent $32/share increased bid they also negotiated a long term reseller agreement that would somehow continue even if HP ends up buying 3PAR.

From 3PAR –

HP’s revised proposal of $33 per share values 3PAR at approximately $2.4 billion

Although 3PAR previously notified Dell of its intention to terminate its merger agreement with Dell, the merger agreement was not terminated and remains in full force and effect. Following 3PAR’s notice of intent to terminate the merger agreement, and prior to receiving HP’s revised acquisition proposal, 3PAR received a revised acquisition proposal from Dell in which Dell increased its offer price from $27 per share to $32 per share. Dell’s revised acquisition proposal also included an increased termination fee of $92 million payable by 3PAR to Dell as a condition to accepting a “superior proposal,” and a multi-year reseller agreement with Dell, which would by its terms be assumed by an acquirer of, or successor in interest to, 3PAR in the event of a change in control of 3PAR (including the acquisition of 3PAR by HP or another third party), and which contained fixed pricing and other terms that the 3PAR board of directors determined to be unacceptable.

So it sounds given the length of time that elapsed for Dell to get this new deal done and how decisive HP has been, Dell likely won’t come back again, and will instead rely on the reseller agreement to get 3PAR technology on the side. Interesting strategy,

I wonder if HP will try to terminate that, even if it means going to court just to block Dell from capitalizing on their pending investment. I would put money down that they will.

If they don’t I wonder how it will make Dell’s customers feel buying HP product from Dell? I mean with all of the sparkling HP logos plastered all over it.

I also believe Dell is putting the final nails in the coffin with their partnership with EMC with this move. EMC has a lot to lose if both HP and Dell are pitching 3PAR technology to their respective customers.

Just goes to show the value that 3PAR brings to the table.

(edited to strike out references to the reseller agreement since I obviously read too quickly before posting, just shows how excited I am I guess!! (not uncommon!) )

Not much details  yet, just notice that HP has upped it’s bid to $33/share for 3PAR a few minutes ago. The front page of the Wall Street Journal has about all I’ve heard from CNBC

Hewlett-Packard has raised its bid for 3PAR to $33 a share; Dell also offered a higher price and negotiated a higher breakup fee

What it seems like is at the last minute Dell finally came through with something around $30/share, sounds like they really struggled to get that one through. HP of course being decisive came back immediately with $33/share.

Here is another article that says the reason why the bidding is so intensive is 3PAR is the only game in town, there is no room for second best –

Looking at the landscape, 3Par is the only real alternative to EMC and Hitachi in terms of high end storage.  EMC has its own ambitions for data center dominance, while HDS is part of a much larger conglomerate.  If you believe you need to own storage and server, both to fulfill the vision above and to avoid partnering with a competitor, than 3Par is the only place to get this type of deep high end storage technology.  Given HP and Dell have a much larger sales channel than 3Par, these guys can immediately double, triple or quadruple sales from 3Par products overnight once it is part of their catalogue.  Both reasons afford the premium we are seeing.