Dell Inc. (NASDAQ: DELL) has agreed to buy virtualized storage vendor Compellent Technologies in an all-cash deal worth US$27.75 per share, a little more than the US$27.50 per share price tag it was discussing with the company last week, but still lower than the stock’s Monday-morning opening price of US$28.30.
Dell hopes to expand its range of enterprise storage products with Compellent’s virtualized storage products, which offer thin provisioning and tiering.
The new price tag values Compellent at around US$960 million, and puts the cost of the deal to Dell at about US$820 million, net of Compellent’s cash. The companies expect to complete the deal early next year, if Compellent’s shareholders approve it.
Whether they will get the chance remains to be seen. The last time Dell bid on a big storage vendor, it ended up in a bidding war with Hewlett-Packard. The price of its acquisition target, 3Par, more than doubled in just a few weeks.