Who's Next To Go In The Software Industry Merger Game?
from the taking-bets-now dept
Ever since Larry Ellison started his publicity-seeking bid to take both PeopleSoft and J.D. Edwards out of the competitive picture, analysts have been jumping up and down trying to determine who's next in the great software industry merger game. Clearly, the industry seems like it's ripe for some more mergers, as the economy hasn't picked up fast enough for many companies to avoid trouble. At the same time, some of these companies have strong products in interesting markets, that could benefit from joining with a larger company. What surprised me, though, is just how few actual examples the analysts and reporters came up with for both buyers and sellers. Also, I've noticed that none of these articles mention the "new wave" of software companies that focus on offering a hosted ASP solution. I would think that such a model poses the largest disruptive "threat" to old-line enterprise software companies, and thus would be the most attractive takeover target. Of course, it sounds like most of enterprise software companies still look on their ASP competitors like any "disruptive technology" - believing that it's simply not good enough to compete.
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