Intel in talks to buy Altera

Intel Corporation is an American Multinational corporation headquartered in Santa Clara, California. Intel is one of the world largest and highest valued semiconductor chip makers, based on revenue. It is the inventor of x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most personal computers. Altera Corporation is an American manufacturer of Programmable Logic Devices (PLD), reconfigurable complex digital circuits. The company released its first PLD in 1984.

People with knowledge of matter said that, Intel is in talks to acquire Altera. Altera shares jumped 28% to $44.39 at the close in New York, giving the company a valuation of about $13.4 Billion. Intel rose 6.4% to $32. Intel is on the hunt for growth as it faces a slowdown in the market for PCs that forced a $1 Billion cut in its first quarter sales forecast earlier this month. This decline comes on top of heavy losses in Intel’s mobile division. The group reported an operating loss of $4.21 Billion in 2014.

A bright spot for Intel is the data center group, where profits soared to $7.28 Billion on sales of $14.4 Billion in 2014. The company benefited from a boom in the amount of data being generated and held in computing centers around the world. Altera makes a broad range of low power semiconductors, which are used in small embedded devices and computer servers for big data centers.

In buying Altera, Intel could expand into markets for automotive, industrial and communication applications, while cementing its leads in data centers. Intel and Altera announced a manufacturing partnership in Feb 2013, agreeing that Altera chips would be made in Intel’s cutting edge plants.

Microsoft buys Office Collaborator app LiveLoop

Microsoft has made another move to augment its productivity services, with the acquisition of an Office collaboration tool developer named LiveLoop for an undisclosed amount. The San-Francisco based LiveLoop is best known for its collaboration tools for Microsoft Office, allowing teams of people to work together on documents.

Its popular LiveLoop for PowerPoint plugin converts presentations into a web URL that becomes a collaborative document accessible by variety of devices without any additional software. Microsoft is facing increased competition in the productivity space. Google, Amazon, Apple and others are all pushing their own productivity suites and Microsoft needs to continue innovating to compete.

Microsoft in the recent past has been making several productivity themed acquisitions, such as Acompli email client, and the Sunrise calendar app. More recently, Microsoft announced its Office productivity suite will be free for devices with screen sizes smaller than 10.1 inches. The company also announced a partnership with Adobe to help build Windows 10’s new default browser ‘Spartan’.

8K Miles acquired Mindprint

San Francisco headquartered 8K Miles Software Services, provider of secure cloud solutions, has entered into an asset purchase agreement with Canada based Mindprint, a clinical research software startup, to strengthen its presence in pharmaceutical vertical. India listed 8K Miles, through its US subsidiary 8K Miles software services, has taken over Mindprint which is focused on Analytics and operational software for Clinical Research Organizations and Pharmaceutical sponsors.

This asset purchase agreement includes acquisitions of intellectual property, client contracts and employees. The total consideration in cash and stock, for the acquisition is $400,000. Large enterprises from healthcare, pharmaceutical, financial and insurance markets use cloud offerings from 8K Miles for security and compliance. Mindprint focuses on analytics and operational software for Clinical Research Organizations (CRO) and pharmaceutical firms based in Markham, Ontario (Canada).

Mindprint deep domain knowledge of CRO and pharma outsourcing operations will provide 8K Miles additional competitive advantage to capitalize on the growth potential in the related markets in India and abroad. 8K Miles was founded by Venkatachari. A cloud solutions and managed Services Company, it provides SMAC (social, mobile, analytics, and cloud) solutions for connectivity between consumers, SMBs, enterprises, and government agencies.

Its flagship solution EzIAM provides capabilities for user management, user provisioning and access requests for end users. Four months ago it had acquired SERJ Solutions and FuGen Solutions, which provides electronic health record (EHR) consulting, custom applications, and support solutions for the healthcare market in November 2014, for an undisclosed amount. 

Star India acquires Screen

Star India is an Indian Media and entertainment company, owned by 21^st Century Fox. It is headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. Star India portfolio includes 48 channels in eight languages. Recently, Star India entered into an agreement with Indian Express Group to acquire film magazine ‘Screen’. Founded in 1951, Screen also owns a popular film awards franchise by the same name.

As part of the transaction, Star will get exclusive ownership of the Screen brand franchise, including all archival material and transfer of key employees. The screen acquisition will yield huge benefits for Star India and Hotstar app, the digital platform. Star has built one of the largest media and entertainment organizations in the country, reaching over 700 million viewers with nearly 40 channels in seven languages.

Screen, with a circulation of nearly 15,000 copies per week, will publish its last print edition this week as Star India takes the entertainment weekly online to be a part of its recently launched digital initiative Hotstar. Hotstar launched on 1 February, is a mobile application that offers more than 35,000 hours of content in seven languages, promising viewers a big library of movies, television shows and even live sports (cricket, football, tennis, and kabaddi).

The deal is estimated to be in the range of Rs 30 crore to Rs 40 crore. The acquisitions means Star now owns the popular screen awards. Last month, Star India acquired Telugu television channel Maa TV in its largest acquisition in India, in a deal estimated to be in excess of Rs 2000 Crore. Hotstar has 35-40 advertisers across various categories including Coca Cola, Nissan, Nestle, and Airtel, as well as e-commerce companies like Snapdeal and Flipkart.

Snapdeal in talks to buy Komli

A major acquisition in the mobile advertising space seems only a matter of time as e-commerce players flex their financial muscle to bring in the next piece of their jigsaw puzzle. Sources indicate that the likes of Flipkart, Snapdeal, Amazon, and Shopclues, are all in the market for acquisition. The target seems to be broadly divided in two categories – mobile tech and mobile banking.

Online retailer Snapdeal is in advanced talks to acquire Komli Media in a deal that values the ad technology company at about $300 Million, the same as when it raised funds from investors. The deal will give Snapdeal engineering capabilities in Bengaluru as it battles Flipkart, as well as it notch up advertising revenues by selling space on the e-commerce site. Snapdeal had an estimated 79.8 monthly visitors in February and Flipkart had 110.5 Million.

Flipkart recently made clear its plans to sell advertising on its platform. The ecommerce firm also acquired ad technology company AdIQuity. Komli was founded by Amar Goel in 2006 and has raised $97 Million in five rounds of funding from investors including Nexus Ventures Partners and Peepul Capital. It employs nearly 300 people across India and started as a digital advertising network – buying and selling advertising inventory online in Asia Pacific.

Goel also set up Pubmatic, focused on technology for online advertising in the US in 2008. InMobi, another ad network based in Bengaluru, was founded a year later and went on to raise $200 Million from Japan Softbank. Driven by increased spending by ecommerce companies, India’s online advertising market is set to grow by 30% this financial year to reach a total size of Rs 3,575 crore. 

GroupM in talks to acquire Foxymoron

GroupM is the world largest advertising media company in terms of billing. It was formed in 2003 by WPP Group to serve as the parent company of WPP media agencies including Maxus, MEC, MediaCom, and Vocanic. It handles over 32% of the world media billings making it the world largest media investment management operation. Foxymoron was started in 2008 as a summer project between four friends and turned into a digital media and marketing company.

Global media firm GroupM is in talks to acquire Foxymoron for about $30 Million, as it seeks to establish dominant position in India. If the deal becomes successful then it will be the latest buyout transaction in the nascent, but fast growing Indian Digital, social media, and marketing sector. Global Media giant JWT is also scouting for potential acquisitions in the space.

Foxymoron provides an across the board range of services, including, end to end digital services, including design and development and social media services. The potential transaction is part of GroupM strategy to establish an even stronger footprint in the country, where it already has a dominant presence. India’s online advertising market is poised to exceed Rs 3500 crore in revenue in 2015.

Spend on video ads will grow at a compounded annual rate of 56% while contributing 12% to the overall market share of digital advertisements. The principal sources of acceleration in 2015 are China, where GroupM predicts ad growth will get back on track to just fewer than 10%, the US, forecast to pick up to 3.9, the Brazil, the UK, Japan and India. Acquisitions have been an important growth strategy for GroupM, which also acquired Chinese Social media agency Teein last year.

News Corp buys VCCircle

News Corporation is an American multinational mass media corporation headquartered in New York City. It was the second largest media group in 2011 in terms of revenue, and the world’s third largest in entertainment in 2009. VCCircle is an Indian Information services group with presence in online business news, data, events, and training for private equity and venture capital fund managers.

VCCircle currently employs about 100 people and is owned by the New Delhi headquartered Mosaic Ventures Private limited with offices in Noida, Mumbai, and Bangalore. The company is recently acquired by News Corp. This was the third investment of News Corp in India. It had previously invested in financial advisory start-up firm BigDecisions.com and realty portal PropTiger.com. News Corp had acquired all networks of VCCircle which includes VCCircle.com, Techcircle.in, VCCEdge, and VCCircle Training.

The VCCircle acquisition builds on News Corp recent digital investments in India. In November, News Corp acquired a 25 percent stake in PropTiger.com, India’s leading online residential real estate platform. In December, News Corp acquired Big Decisions.com, which aims to help Indian consumers make smarter financial decisions through interactive, decision making tools powered by sophisticated algorithms and data.

News Corp also has a presence in India through its Dow Jones, Wall Street Journal, and Harper Collins Publisher Business. News Corp is a global, diversified media, and information Services Company focused on creating and distributing authoritative and engaging content to consumers throughout the world. The company comprises business across a range of Media. 

Facebook buys TheFind.com

TheFind.com is a discovery shopping search Engine targeting lifestyle product such as apparel, accessories, home, and garden, fitness, kids and family and beauty. It was founded in 2006 as FatLens Inc., initially specializing in event tickets search but later expanding to product search. The site was re-launched as TheFind.com with an emphasis on discovery shopping search or lifestyle products.

TheFind is the only way to search the entire shoppable web. Its proprietary search engine lets you type in something you are looking to purchase like a white dress, or a specific type of chair, and it will return results from online retailers such as Target, Nordstrom, Zappos, Amazon, Etsy, eBay and more. If consumers want to search locally, TheFind can return results within their geographic activity.

Consumers can easily compare prices between different retailers and save themselves time by not having to scour each individual site. TheFind search engine will shut down as the company merges with its new owner. This service is used by more than 15 Million shoppers. Just last month, Facebook launched a special ad unit designed to highlight specific products a merchant is trying to sell. TheFind could help Facebook better match not just a company to a user, but make sure the products shown in the ads are things they are likely to buy.

TheFind.com is a privately held company in California, and received funding from Redpoint Ventures, Lightspeed venture partners, and Cambrian Ventures. In 2007, they received an additional $15 Million funding led by Bain Capital Ventures.

Flipkart acquires AdIQuity

Indian E-commerce giant made its first acquisition of the year; acquired Bengaluru based AdIQuity, a global mobile ad network enabling app developers and mobile publisher’s revenues from their mobile inventory. AdIQuity is backed by VC’s like Sequoia Capital and has raised $15 Million across two rounds in 2006 and 2008.

Founded by IITian Anurag Dod, AdIQuity also facilitates ad agencies, ad networks, DSPs and other media buyers to acquire global mobile traffic. The nine year old venture claims to have 150 Million monthly active users in its network spread across 200 countries generating 25 Billion ad impressions every month. The country’s most valuable startup, valued at $11 Billion is seeking to expand its presence and capabilities by the inorganic way this year. The AdIQuity acquisition will enable.

Flipkart to boost its external marketing capabilities as it aims to diversify into online advertising and brand consulting for vendors. The additional revenues from these verticals would help Flipkart in becoming profitable prior to a listing. Having kicked off the acquisitions, it would be worth looking at the newer capabilities the company would be looking at. Last year, to strengthen its fashion vertical it bought out Myntra in one of the largest deals in the startup space.

Recently, Snapdeal acquired premium and luxury fashion retailer, Exclusively.com and Wishpicker.com, an online gift recommendation portal. While Amazon picked up a minority stake in Gift card Technology and retail firm, QwikCilver Solutions.

PayPal buys Mobile Payment startup Paydiant

PayPal is an American international Digital wallet based e-commerce business allowing payments and money transfers to be made through the internet. Online money transfers serve as electronic alternatives to paying with traditional paper methods, such as checks and money orders. PayPal is one of the world’s largest internet payment companies. The company operates as an acquirer, performing payment processing for online vendors, auction sites and other commercial users, for which it charges a fee.

The eBay payment unit plans to acquire Paydiant, a payments startup that licenses a technology platform used by big retail chains to create their own branded mobile wallet apps. PayPal will pay around $280 Million for the startup. Founded in 2010, Paydiant white label platform is used by Subway and other retailers and banks to add payment, loyalty, and digital coupon capabilities to their own apps. Its customer list also includes MCX, a consortium of big box retailers led by Walmart that says it will launch its mobile wallet app this year.

Competition in the mobile wallet sector is heating up with the launch of Apple Pay, Samsung offering Samsung Pay beginning this summer and Google teaming up with Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile to have its Google Wallet payment service built into Android phones sold by those carriers. EBay has been planning to spin off its PayPal payment business in the second half of this year.

In 2013, PayPal had acquired mobile payment service Venmo. PayPal has also announced that its Here card reader for mobile payments will soon support the wireless payment technology. The NFC enabled version of Here will pair with phones via Bluetooth, and supports traditional chip and PIN methods. The new NFC enabled PayPal Here Chip and PIN card reader, which will start rolling out in the UK and Australia this summer, and in the US later this year.

Hewlett Packard acquires Aruba Networks

Hewlett Packard Company is an American Multinational Information Technology corporation. It provides software, hardware, and services to consumers, small and medium sized business and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health, and education sectors. Aruba Networks is a networking vendor selling enterprise wireless LAN and edge access networking equipment. Their core products are access points, mobility controllers, and network management software through their Airwave Management platform product.

Recently, HP acquired Aruba Networks in a deal valued at $2.7 Billion. The deal will expand HP presence in the mobile market, supporting faster speeds and access to cloud applications. Each company’s board of directors has approved the deal. HP has had a dismal record for big acquisitions, having written off multibillion dollar acquisitions of Autonomy and technology outsourcing provider EDS, which it bought in 2008.

HP, which has struggled to adapt to the new era of mobile and online computing, plans to shift into two listed companies this year, separating its computer and printer businesses from its corporate hardware and services operations. Aruba Networks was founded in 2002 and makes the hardware and software used to build Wi-Fi networks for customers. It currently maintains around 1,800 employees and saw revenues of $729 Million in fiscal 2014.

Aruba clients include KFC, University of Miami/University of Miami Health System, and Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi. Aruba has offices throughout the Americas, Asia-Pacific/Japan and the Europe/Middle East/Africa Regions. The company raised its last series D round back in 2006 from investors such as ARTIS ventures, Trinity Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Matrix Partners, and Focus Ventures.  

Reliance Infrastructure acquires Pipavav Defence

Reliance Infrastructure Ltd., formerly known as Reliance Energy and before that as Bombay Suburban Electric Supply is India’s largest private sector enterprise power utility. It is part of the Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group, one of India’s largest conglomerates. The company is the sole distributor of electricity to consumers in the suburbs of Mumbai. It also runs power generation, transmission, and distribution businesses in other parts of Maharashtra, Goa, and Andhra Pradesh.

Reliance Infrastructure, through its subsidiary Reliance Defence Systems Pvt. Ltd., will acquire 130 Million equity shares from the promoters of Pipavav Defence at a price of Rs 63 per share. After the acquisition, Reliance Defence Systems will make an open offer to acquire an additional 26% stake in the company from public shareholders at Rs 66 per share. JM Financial Institutional Securities Ltd will be the sole financial advisor and the manager to the open offer.

Pipavav Defence is the India first world class integrated Defence production, ship building and offshore infrastructure company. It is the country’s first private sector company to get the license and contracts to build frontline warships for Indian Navy. It has one of the world’s largest infrastructure facilities. It is spreads over 841 acres of land on the Gujarat coast and has India’s largest and one of the world’s largest dry docks, measuring 662 meters in length and 65 meters in width.

India is one of the largest spenders on defence equipment. According to government estimates, the cumulative defence budget, consisting of capital and revenue expenditure, has increased 32% between fiscal 2011 and fiscal 2014 to Rs 2.04 Lakh crore. About 70% of India’s defence requirements are met through imports and the rest through local production by state owned companies.

EXL Service to buy analytics company RPM

EXL service is a provider IT services, decision analytics, operation management, outsourcing, and transformation services company. It is primarily engaged in providing a range of outsourcing services, business process outsourcing, and infrastructure services. EXL services are structured around insurance, banking, financial services, utilities, healthcare, transportation, and travel industries.

The company said it is buying analytics firm RPM Direct for about $74 Million to expand its portfolio. EXL said the deal involves $47 Million in cash up to $23 Million of contingent cash consideration and $4 Million of restricted stock. The acquisition likely to close by the end of March is expected to add to EXL adjusted earnings per share. RPM will become the part of EXL Analytics Group.

RPM possesses a unique combination of strong analytical and data management capabilities with deep industry expertise in the P&C, life and health insurance markets. RPM technology helps analyze large consumer sets to segment populations, predict response rates, forecast customer lifetime value, design, and execute targeted, multi-channel marketing campaigns. The firm’s focus areas include the insurance industry.

RPM maintains its own database and supports data on over 250 Million consumers and 120 Million US households. The quantity and unique combination of data attributes managed by RPM drives optimal, data driven decision making and enable it to build models that analyze prospects individually. RPM employs proprietary predictive analytics and domain specific pattern recognition algorithms to deliver results through a flexible, on demand service model. The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of 2015.

Valeant to buy Salix

Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, Inc. is a publicly traded pharmaceutical company based in Montreal, Canada. The company focuses on neurology, dermatology, and infectious disease with several drugs in late stage clinical trials and several currently on the market. Salix Pharmaceuticals Inc. is a specialist American Pharmaceutical Company. It develops drugs and medical devices that prevent and treat various gastrointestinal disorders.

In a most recent deal, Valeant announced a $14.6 Billion cash deal to acquire Salix. While, Valeant has completed roughly 40 acquisitions since 2008, giving it a diversified portfolio of some 1,500 drugs in every conceivable branch of medicine. In spite of Valeant more than doubling its share count over the last five years to help fund its acquisitions, it has a truckload of debt. The company trimmed a total of $1 Billion from its previous $16.3 Billion debt load.

The company said the deal had an enterprise value of $14.5 Billion, which would include Salix’s debt and any cash on hand. Valeant will pay $158.00 a share, valuing all cash transaction at about $10.1 Billion. The merger is expected to yield more than $500 Million in annual cost savings within six months.

The deal is the largest ever for Valeant, which lost a takeover contest for Allergan Inc. last year. Valeant also released its fourth quarter results with the announcement, posting net income of $534.1 Million, or $1.56 per diluted share, compared to $125.0 Million in the year earlier period, or 36 cents per diluted share. Revenue rose to $2.28 Billion, up from $2.06 Billion in the fourth quarter of 2013.