Cisco's TANDBERG purchase rejected by shareholders

Hold your horses, mergers and acquisitions fans. It looks like Cisco's march to control every segment of IP communications has been stopped in its tracks. TANDBERG's shareholders--who own just over 24 percent of the video conferencing technology provider--have rejected Cisco's $3 billion bid as too small.

Cisco needs 90 percent of TANDBERG's shareholders to approve its bid and analysts believe that it can afford to sweeten the deal. The market premium of Cisco's offer was only 11 percent, and although Cisco maintains its bid was a fair offer, shareholders have described it as inadequate. Shareholders seem to want Cisco CEO John Chambers to put more money behind his earnings call claim: "We continue to believe that video architecture is the most important Web 2.0 next-generation play."

It was reported that Cisco Systems bought TANDBERG for $3 billion on Oct. 1, in an attempt to bring more video technology in house, but it seems like the deal was not yet approved by all the parties involved. TANDBERG's products are less expensive than Cisco's high-end Telepresence gear, so Cisco will add market spectrum by acquiring TANDBERG.

Read more:
- check out this Reuters story [1]

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