Broadcom Said To Be In Talks To Buy Symantec, the Security Software Maker (nytimes.com) 39
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Broadcom is in advanced talks to buy cybersecurity firm Symantec, according to people familiar with the matter, seeking a further expansion into the more profitable software business. Broadcom could reach an agreement to buy the Mountain View, California-based company within weeks, said the people, who asked to not be identified because the matter isn't public. No deal has been finalized and the talks could fall through, the people said. "Broadcom's potential purchase of another asset with $4+ billion in software sales is likely its most ambitious deal yet -- leaderless Symantec has been losing share, even in its core segments," says Bloomberg's technology analyst Anand Srinivasan. "Broadcom CEO Hock Tan will likely need to aggressively cut Symantec costs while keeping sales stable."
The report also adds that if this deal does happen, it "would mark Broadcom's second big bet in software, following its $18 billion takeover last year of CA Technologies."
The report also adds that if this deal does happen, it "would mark Broadcom's second big bet in software, following its $18 billion takeover last year of CA Technologies."
How does this make sense? (Score:3)
How does this make any sense at all? They are in completely different businesses.
It is sort of like a gas station in New York merging with a pig farm in Nebraska.
The only thing these two companies have in common is that I hate both of them.
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How does this make any sense at all? They are in completely different businesses.
Ya, that would be like some guy owning, say, Amazon and The Washington Post or SpaceX and Tesla -- completely different things.
Re: How does this make sense? (Score:1)
Not even remotely comparable. At least for Musk. He didn't buy anything out he founded SpaceX and Tesla.
And the headline doesn't need to tell us who Symantec is, we know. They aren't good at security. Broadcom would do better to build a security firm from the ground up than adopt Symantec BS.
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You could say the same thing about Computer Associates however.
It is like the greatest collection of the most loathed has-beens in computer software industry.
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It makes sense in that in the eyes of Broadcom Symantec is spending too much on R&D or not charging enough for software that is hard to replace.
Broadcom (Avago) buys companies that have potential to have higher margins then chops personnel and rises prices to get those margins. It does no grow by developing new products buy by buying companies that have successful products. After they got show down in buying Qualcomm there is not an available hardware maker that meets those needs. Buying CA showed th
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What I think is happening is Broadcom is doing their usual.
They have such a rivalry with Intel they must pursue their stupid business deals. Intel bought McAfee, so in their mind buying Symantec sounds like a great idea.
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They also own CA, which has overlap with Semantic.
What?!? Broadcom owns California? If I had known that California was up for sale, I would have put in a bid. I realize that California is perpetually on the brink of bankruptcy, but if a hedge fund would make a hostile move to privatize California, they could do the necessary Ginsu slicing and dicing and spiral slicing to transform California into a profitable financial success.
But seriously . . . maybe Broadcom wants to put some security stuff on silicon . . . ?
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Their products may be shitty but there are few alternatives, especially in enterprise space. Name me one alternative to PGP, and don't point me to GPG which is unsupported and will not be used in enterprise, and believe me I tried.
They have number of products that are used by companies and probably have huge sales and marketing force to push these. These are the people who will get cut if acquisition is real and goes through.
I personally would not touch Symantec products with a 10 feet poll but companies us
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>The only thing these two companies have in common is that I hate both of them.
That is the point. It is not only you who hates them, it is very common and they are trying to build an (another) evil empire.
Eventually they will likely merge with the likes of Electronic arts and Facebook through a few more mergers for the final result.
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Intel bought McAfee
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/0... [nytimes.com]
they couldn't really make it work, though.
i guess Broadcom wants to make the same mistake, showing the world that they can do anything Intel can.
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This.
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Not quite. Broadcom is a turnkey maker of parts. That is, they make both hardware and software - most of the software they use to drive their parts comes direct from them after all.
So Broadcom doesn't just supply you a "WiFi chip", they sell you a "WiFi solution" consisting of a chipset and software to go with it.
Anyone who has used a Raspberry Pi knows how bad Broadcom documentation is - that's because you're not really meant
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It is called the ITT model.
It sure worked great for ITT. Not.
Um ... (Score:2)
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Well, if you didn't know what Symantec was, it would help to know I guess.
So... if you didn't know -- but you're also reading /. ? Okay. :-)
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Intel McAfee (Score:1)
Remember when Intel bought McAfee? At least that kind of made sense because Intel sold chips to the same OEMs that bundled McAfee trials. It worked out about as well as this Broadcom deal will work.
Broadcom must have a lot of money to light on fire (Score:4, Informative)
Cause I can't think of anything useful that Symantec makes or sells.
Reminds me when Verizon stupidly burned a pile of cashing buying AOL and Yahoo. I'm sure the Verizon stockholders got a lot of value over that one, snort.
How are they still in business? (Score:2)
These huge "security" companies are shit, and have been shit for at least the past 10+ years; how do they still have value?
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