HP to buy BEA, perhaps

MIDDLEWARE veteran BEA Systems is being linked with a sale to HP by an analyst, sending BEA shares up 5.2 per cent. This time, the talk is from Terry Tillman of SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, although HP-BEA has done the rumour rounds for some time.

The deal might make sense, however. HP is talking a good talk about its try, try and try again software business and BEA is on the end of a stock-grants probe. Mercury had much bigger regulatory problems but that didn't deter HP buying it. Also, HP's failure to make anything of its Bluestone purchase of 2000 gives it a free run at the appserver/integration sector.

It can't be easy being BEA when every quarter there's a new rumour you're going to be acquired. Oracle's Larry Ellison didn't help when he disclosed in 2004 that Oracle had considered a deal to buy BEA. TV stock tipper Jim Cramer also listed BEA as one of his top tech bets for a sale back in July 2006.

Of course, Oracle has shown with Siebel and PeopleSoft that it doesn't mind buying companies that cut across existing software lines, so it could still be interested in BEA. Well, it wouldn't be a software merger without a reference to the Big O, would it? µ