Cirrus Logic, Inc. (NASDAQ : CRUS) and Wolfson Microelectronics plc (LSE : WLF or WLF.L) today announced the terms of a recommended transaction under which Cirrus Logic would acquire Wolfson at a price of £2.35 per share in cash, implying an enterprise value of £278 million, or approximately $467 million. The transaction, if approved, is expected to strengthen Cirrus Logic's ability to expand its customer base with highly differentiated, end-to-end audio solutions for portable audio applications. The transaction will be financed by a combination of existing cash on Cirrus Logic's balance sheet and $225 million in debt funding.

"Wolfson has a rich history of audio innovation, a broad catalog of audio products and a first class customer list," said Jason Rhode, Cirrus Logic President and Chief Executive Officer. "This acquisition strengthens Cirrus Logic's core business as a leader in audio signal processing components, enhances our ability to differentiate our products with software, and adds new product categories such as MEMS microphones to our portfolio."

IBM has announced that it will establish a new Big Data and Business Analytics Center of Competence in Athens, Greece advancing its ability to deliver Big Data and Business Analytics technical and consulting capabilities in the region, drawing on an emerging generation of highly skilled local expertise.
The new center will help companies to better leverage analytics and cognitive computing capabilities, improving business operations and enhancing their competitiveness in the global marketplace.

The new Center will lead Big Data and Business Analytics client engagements in the region, working closely with IBM's global network of Business Analytics Centers in Berlin, Beijing, Dallas, London, New York, Tokyo, Washington and Zurich.

Seagate Technology plc, a world leader in storage solutions, today announced it has completed its previously announced acquisition of Xyratex Ltd, a leading provider of data storage technology.

"Exabyte growth is accelerating, and we are building higher capacity drives to address this growth," said Dave Mosley, President of Operations and Technology at Seagate. "The time required to properly test these higher capacity drives is increasing dramatically, making it strategically important to have uninterrupted access to world-class test equipment and engineering resources. The addition of Xyratex helps us fill this important need and considerably streamlines Seagate's supply and manufacturing chains for our core HDD business."

Lenovo Group today announced record results for its third fiscal quarter ended December 31, 2013, driven by strong global execution, an innovative product portfolio and an increasing mix of PC Plus revenues. Quarterly revenue was US$10.8 billion, a 15 percent increase year-over-year, passing the US$10 billion milestone for the first time ever. Third quarter profit grew even faster with pre-tax income increasing 30 percent year-over-year to US$321 million, while earnings also grew 30 percent year-over-year to US$265 million. Lenovo shipped a record 32.6 million devices in the quarter or nearly 5 devices every second. Lenovo's third quarter mix of sales from its Mobile Internet and Digital Home division which develops PC Plus products such as smartphones, tablets and smart TVs, was 16 percent of total revenues, up from 11 percent one year ago and seven percent two years ago, with steadily improving profitability.

For the third straight quarter, Lenovo was the world's largest PC vendor, with its highest-ever quarterly market share of 18.5 percent, up 2.4 points year-over-year. Record high share in EMEA, Asia Pacific and China with number one positions in five of the seventh largest PC markets globally - supported this strong performance. Lenovo's PC shipments for the third fiscal quarter were 15.3 million units, again making it the fastest growing of the top five PC vendors. This was also the 19th quarter in a row that Lenovo outperformed the industry as a whole, growing at a 14 point premium to the market.

Lenovo and IBM have entered into a definitive agreement in which Lenovo plans to acquire IBM's x86 server business. This includes System x, BladeCenter and Flex System blade servers and switches, x86-based Flex integrated systems, NeXtScale and iDataPlex servers and associated software, blade networking and maintenance operations. The purchase price is approximately US$2.3 billion, approximately two billion of which will be paid in cash and the balance in Lenovo stock.

IBM will retain its System z mainframes, Power Systems, Storage Systems, Power-based Flex servers, and PureApplication and PureData appliances. The agreement builds upon a longstanding collaboration that began in 2005 when Lenovo acquired IBM's PC business, which included the ThinkPad line of PCs. In the period since the companies have continued to collaborate in many areas. IBM will continue to develop and evolve its Windows and Linux software portfolio for the x86 platform. IBM is a leading developer of software products for x86 servers with thousands of products and tens of thousands of software developer and services professionals who build software for x86 systems.

LSI Corporation (NASDAQ: LSI) today reported results for its fourth quarter ended December 31, 2013. On December 15, 2013, LSI entered into a definitive agreement with Avago Technologies Limited (NASDAQ: AVGO) under which Avago has agreed to acquire LSI for $11.15 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $6.6 billion. In anticipation of this transaction, which is expected to close in the first half of 2014, LSI will not issue financial guidance for the upcoming quarter or conduct a fourth quarter results conference call. LSI has also discontinued its quarterly dividend and stock repurchases.

"We ended the year on a strong note, with solid quarterly results and the announcement of Avago's proposed acquisition of LSI," said Abhi Talwalkar, LSI's president and CEO. "Our employees did a great job in the quarter and in the year, bringing several exciting new products to market and expanding our capabilities to better serve our growing customer base in flash storage, datacenters and mobile networks."

Toshiba Corporation, a global technology leader and manufacturer of NAND flash memory, today announced that the Company has finalized the purchase of substantially all assets of OCZ Technology Group, making it a wholly owned subsidiary and Toshiba Group Company. Effective immediately, the Group company will operate independently as OCZ Storage Solutions, a leading provider of high-performance solid state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems.

The acquisition provides Toshiba with OCZ's enterprise and client SSD businesses and enables the established OCZ brand to continue in full force with a current product portfolio that includes SATA and PCIe consumer drives for high-performance and mainstream applications, and SATA, SAS and PCIe enterprise drives supported by virtualization, cache and acceleration software. OCZ Storage Solutions will leverage Toshiba's cutting-edge NAND and combine it with the Company's proprietary controllers, firmware and software to provide both client and enterprise customers with innovative and cost-effective solid-state storage solutions.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced that the Company received approval by the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware to sell substantially all of its assets to Toshiba Corporation. The transaction is expected to close within the next week, subject to the satisfaction or waiver of other customary closing conditions under the Asset Purchase Agreement. With this asset purchase, the popular OCZ SSD brand supporting a complete portfolio of enterprise and consumer drives continues in full force leveraged by Toshiba's financial strength and its portfolio of NAND flash memory.

"We are pleased by the court's approval as this business combination allows the company to continue to bring to market disruptive solid state storage technology. We are appreciative of all the support provided by our shareholders, creditors, and vendors which allowed this combination to occur," said Ralph Schmitt, CEO for OCZ Technology. "The OCZ team is excited to be a part of an innovative company like Toshiba where we can continue to develop new and unique SSD technologies that position the Company as a solid state solutions leader in both the client and enterprise storage markets."

Seagate Technology plc (NASDAQ: STX), a world leader in storage solutions, and Xyratex Ltd (NASDAQ: XRTX), a leading provider of data storage technology, today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Seagate will acquire all outstanding shares of Xyratex in an all-cash transaction valued at $13.25 per share, or a total of approximately $374 million, including approximately $80 million in cash on Xyratex's balance sheet as of August 31, 2013. The consideration represents a premium of approximately 27% per share over Xyratex's stock price at the close of trading on December 20, 2013.

Xyratex has developed a leading hard disk drive ("HDD") capital test equipment business. The acquisition of this business will further strengthen Seagate's vertically integrated supply and manufacturing chain for disk drives and ensure uninterrupted access to important capital equipment. The acquisition also expands Seagate's storage solutions portfolio by adding Xyratex's industry-leading enterprise data storage systems and high-performance computing business. Seagate will operate this business as a standalone entity and will focus on opportunities to improve and expand the business.

Avago Technologies Limited and LSI Corporation today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Avago will acquire LSI for $11.15 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at $6.6 billion. The acquisition creates a highly diversified semiconductor market leader with approximately $5 billion in annual revenues by adding enterprise storage to Avago's existing wired infrastructure, wireless and industrial businesses. The combined company will be strongly positioned to capitalize on the growing opportunities created by the rapid increases in data center IP and mobile data traffic.

"This highly complementary and compelling acquisition positions Avago as a leader in the enterprise storage market and expands our offerings and capabilities in wired infrastructure, particularly system-level expertise," stated Hock Tan, President and Chief Executive Officer of Avago. "This combination will increase the Company's scale and diversify our revenue and customer base. In addition to these powerful strategic benefits, as we integrate LSI onto the Avago platform, we expect to drive LSI's operating margins toward Avago's current levels, creating significant additional value for stockholders."

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced that the Company has signed an asset purchase agreement with Toshiba Corporation, a global technology leader and manufacturer of NAND flash memory, to acquire substantially all of OCZ's assets in a chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding for $35M.

Under this agreement Toshiba will acquire OCZ's client and enterprise solid state drive business. OCZ will continue to operate and serve existing and future customers during this process. Toshiba has agreed to provide the Company with DIP (Debtor-in-Possession) financing to ensure that there is adequate capital and flash supply to support the business during the contemplated sale period. The consummation of the asset purchase agreement is subject to an auction and approval by the bankruptcy court in the Company's bankruptcy case.

TDK Corporation has announced that its Thailand-based HDD suspension assemblies subsidiary Magnecomp Precision Technology Public Company Limited ("MPT") concluded an agreement in October to acquire two HDD-related companies (EntroComponent Solutions, LLC and EntroComponent Solutions Singapore Pte Ltd) from U.S.-based specialty polymer and resin manufacturer entrotech Inc. MPT also inked a business alliance agreement with entrotech.

entrotech mainly manufactures and sells specialty polymers and resins. Products employing these materials span a wide range of fields, including automotive films, HDD-related components, aircraft paint, and medical products. The HDD-related product manufacturing and sales companies subject to this acquisition handle vibration dampening materials attached to HDD head suspensions, as well as filters, sealants and other products for HDDs. MPT specializes in the manufacture and sales of suspension assemblies for HDD heads, supplying products globally from its base in Thailand.

Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) announced today the pricing of the previously announced underwritten secondary public offering of 10,869,566 shares of its common stock by Hitachi, Ltd. (the "Selling Stockholder"), at a price to the public of $67.00 per share. The Selling Stockholder has also granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 1,630,434 shares.

An aggregate amount of 25 million shares of the company's common stock were issued to the Selling Stockholder in connection with Western Digital's acquisition of Viviti Technologies Ltd., formerly known as Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Holdings Pte. Ltd., in March 2012. Upon completion of the offering, the Selling Stockholder will beneficially own 14,130,434 shares of the company's common stock (12,500,000 shares if the underwriters exercise in full their option to purchase additional shares) and will continue to have two designated directors on the company's board of directors pursuant to the terms of an investor rights agreement between the company and the Selling Stockholder.

Western Digital Corp. announced today that it has completed the acquisition of Virident Systems, Inc., a leading provider of server-side flash storage for virtualization, database, cloud computing, and webscale applications. Virident will be integrated into HGST, a wholly owned subsidiary of Western Digital. The acquisition furthers HGST's strategy to address the rapidly changing needs of enterprise customers by delivering intelligent storage solutions that maximize application performance by leveraging the tightly coupled server, storage and network resources of today's converged datacenter infrastructures.

The Virident acquisition follows HGST's recent purchase of sTec, an early innovator in enterprise solid-state drives (SSDs) and VeloBit, an advanced I/O optimization software company. These investments expand HGST's presence in the rapidly growing and strategic enterprise SSD space, which IDC predicts will grow from $2.5 billion in revenue in 2012 to $7.2 billion in revenue by 2017.

IBM today announced it has acquired Daeja Image Systems Ltd., a leading provider of software that makes it easier for business and IT professionals to view large documents and images. Daeja is a privately held software company with headquarters in Milton Keynes, UK. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

As unstructured business data continues to grow exponentially, business users need not only access to information, but a compelling user experience as well. By putting content in the context of how people work every day, professionals can solve problems and make decisions that deliver better outcomes, faster.

Western Digital Corp. announced today that it has completed the acquisition of sTec, Inc., an early innovator in enterprise solid-state drives (SSDs). sTec will be integrated into HGST, a wholly owned subsidiary of Western Digital. The acquisition augments HGST's existing solid-state storage capabilities, accelerating its ability to expand its participation in the rapidly growing area of enterprise SSDs.

Completion of the sTec acquisition follows HGST's recent purchase of VeloBit, an advanced SSD caching software company, and the proposed acquisition of Virident, an innovative provider of server-side flash storage solutions. Collectively these building blocks expand HGST's presence in the enterprise SSD space, which IDC predicts will grow from $2.5B in revenue in 2012 to $7B in revenue by 2017.

Western Digital Corp. and Virident Systems, Inc. announced today that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which Virident, a provider of server-side flash storage solutions, will be acquired by HGST, a wholly owned subsidiary of Western Digital. Virident will be acquired for approximately $685 million in cash. This represents approximately $645 million in enterprise value, net of Virident's estimated cash balance at closing.

Virident is a technology leader in one of the fastest growing segments in enterprise and cloud computing. Virident solutions enable enterprises to tackle performance-intensive datacenter applications with PCIe-based enterprise flash storage solutions for virtualization, database, cloud computing, and webscale applications. Virident's FlashMAX II can be installed in any server and provides the highest capacity in a single low-profile card, enabling organizations to maximize the use of valuable datacenter space, reduce datacenter sprawl and provide uncompromising performance. In addition, the company's FlashMAX Connect is the industry's first software suite to deliver a shared server-side flash storage tier with enterprise-class reliability.

Microsoft Corporation and Nokia Corporation today announced that the Boards of Directors for both companies have decided to enter into a transaction whereby Microsoft will purchase substantially all of Nokia's Devices & Services business, license Nokia's patents, and license and use Nokia's mapping services.

Under the terms of the agreement, Microsoft will pay EUR 3.79 billion to purchase substantially all of Nokia's Devices & Services business, and EUR 1.65 billion to license Nokia's patents, for a total transaction price of EUR 5.44 billion in cash. Microsoft will draw upon its overseas cash resources to fund the transaction. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2014, subject to approval by Nokia's shareholders, regulatory approvals and other closing conditions.

SanDisk Corporation, a global leader in flash memory storage solutions, today announced it has completed its acquisition of SMART Storage Systems, a developer of enterprise solid state drives based on the SATA and SAS storage protocols. With the completion of the acquisition, SMART Storage Systems is being combined with SanDisk's Enterprise Storage Solutions, which will be led by John Scaramuzzo. John has been the President of SMART Storage Systems and is a veteran of the storage industry with more than 25 years of experience at Seagate, Maxtor, Quantum and Digital Equipment Corporation. John assumes the role of senior vice president, enterprise storage solutions, reporting to Sanjay Mehrotra, president and chief executive officer.

"I am delighted to welcome the employees of SMART Storage Systems to SanDisk and to build upon our momentum in the enterprise storage market," said Mehrotra. "This acquisition enables SanDisk to address a large market opportunity in enterprise SATA products, and complements our strong enterprise SAS product portfolio. With this combination, SanDisk will have enterprise SSDs qualified with six of the top seven storage OEMs worldwide."

Micron Technology, Inc. (Nasdaq:MU) ("Micron") and Elpida Memory, Inc. ("Elpida") trustees announced today the closing of Micron's acquisition of 100 percent of Elpida's equity, pursuant to a Sponsor Agreement entered into on July 2, 2012 in connection with Elpida's corporate reorganization proceedings conducted under the jurisdiction of the Tokyo District Court. In a related transaction, Micron also announced today the completion of its acquisition of a 24 percent share of Rexchip Electronics Corporation from Powerchip Technology Corporation and certain of its affiliates. The transactions will be recorded for accounting purposes as being effective at 11:59 p.m., Tokyo time, on July 31, 2013.

Elpida's assets include a 300 millimeter (mm) DRAM fabrication facility located in Hiroshima, Japan; an approximate 65 percent ownership interest in Rexchip, whose assets include a 300mm DRAM fabrication facility located in Taiwan; and a 100 percent ownership interest in Akita Elpida Memory, Inc., whose assets include an assembly and test facility located in Akita, Japan. Together with the Rexchip shares acquired from Powerchip, Micron will control approximately 89 percent of Rexchip's outstanding shares and 100 percent of Rexchip product supply. The manufacturing assets of Elpida and Rexchip together can produce more than 185,000 300mm wafers per month, which represents an approximate 45 percent increase in Micron's current manufacturing capacity.

Western Digital Corporation and sTec, Inc. announced today that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which sTec, Inc., an early innovator in enterprise solid-state drives (SSDs), will be acquired by HGST, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Western Digital. sTec will be acquired for approximately $340 million in cash, which equates to $6.85 per share. This represents approximately $207 million in enterprise value, net of sTec's cash as of March 31, 2013.

The pending acquisition augments HGST's existing solid-state storage capabilities, accelerating its ability to expand its participation in the rapidly growing area of enterprise SSDs. HGST remains committed to its highly successful joint development program with Intel Corp. and will continue to deliver current and future SAS-based SSD products with Intel.

McAfee today announced the execution of a definitive agreement to initiate a conditional tender offer for the acquisition of Stonesoft Oyj, a leading innovator in next-generation network firewall products, for an aggregate equity value of approximately $389 million in cash.

Stonesoft delivers software-based, dynamic, customer-driven, cyber security solutions to secure information flow and simplify security management. Stonesoft's product portfolio of next-generation firewalls, evasion prevention systems, and SSL VPN solutions addresses businesses of all sizes. Through the pending acquisition of Stonesoft, McAfee expects to extend its leadership position in network security.

Even as Corsair is looking to raise $78 million through an initial public offering (IPO), with a share price of $13, the company is reportedly in talks with Francisco Partners, a tech startup-focused venture capital company, over its possible acquisition. Francisco Partners was part of the consortium, which was led by Blackstone Group, to acquire Dell. This came to light when CNN unearthed an regulatory filing (PDF). Another theory doing rounds states that Corsair and Francisco Partners could be exploring other options than a buyout. In 2011, Corsair reported a revenue of $455 million, with net income of $19 million. In Q1 2012, it reported $132 million revenue, with $3 million net income. Corsair specializes in a wide range of gaming- and enthusiast-PC hardware, and peripherals.

Intel Corporation today reported first-quarter revenue of $12.6 billion, operating income of $2.5 billion, net income of $2.0 billion and EPS of $0.40. The company generated approximately $4.3 billion in cash from operations, paid dividends of $1.1 billion, and used $533 million to repurchase 25 million shares of stock.

"Amidst market softness, Intel performed well in the first quarter and I'm excited about what lies ahead for the company," said Paul Otellini, Intel president and CEO. "We shipped our next generation PC microprocessors, introduced a new family of products for micro-servers and will ship our new tablet and smartphone microprocessors this quarter. We are working with our customers to introduce innovative new products across multiple operating systems. The transition to 14nm technology this year will significantly increase the value provided by Intel architecture and process technology for our customers and in the marketplace."

Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) today announced that Mark Long has been named executive vice president of strategy and corporate development. Long has an extensive background in corporate strategy, mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and investment banking. He will oversee Western Digital's strategic planning and be responsible for the company's corporate development activities. Long will also lead Western Digital Capital, a strategic investment fund targeting innovative companies within the broader storage industry and related markets aligned to Western Digital's strategic plan.

"Mark is an excellent addition to the Western Digital senior leadership team," said Steve Milligan , president and chief executive officer, Western Digital. "He brings tremendous strategic and operational ability to this role, including an extensive background in mergers and acquisitions. He will focus on executing our growth strategy and capitalizing on the many opportunities present in today's dynamic storage industry."