The C.E.O. of Symantec Corp., Enrique Salem, has very strong intentions to make some valued acquisitions this year, he is scheduled to present his plans of acquiring other security and storage software companies to the investors next week. Symantec being the world's fifth largest software maker, has not made any large acquisition yet, except the last years purchase of VeriSign Inc, which creates technology for secured payments over the Internet, for the amount of $1.3 billion.
Image via WikipediaThis Tuesday, while attending the Reuters Global Technology Summit in New York, Salem told that making such an expensive acquisition is still possible for the company; however, he seemed more inclined towards smaller, "tuck-in" acquisitions. The prime targets of acquisition for Symantec this year could be the companies working in the field of not only storage or security companies but cloud computing and virtualization too.
He asserted that Symantec may even make a decision just next week in its annual analyst meeting in New York, the company has $3 billion in cash and it just has to decide the deals. The budget of last year for acquisitions was $2 billion, from which it not only bought VeriSign assets, but also a private data encryption software maker, PGP Corp for $300 million.
Salem told that he is foreseeing an air of consolidation in the technology industry, as within the next few years the big software makers are expected to eat up the smaller ones. He stated that “My expectation is that consolidation will continue. You'll see meaningful consolidation that will change tech meaningfully.” Salem also stated that Symantec is considering having its holdings in a joint venture with the Chinese Huawei Technologies Co, which has specialized in computers for security and storage.
Generally the U.S. investors have shown an inclination to buy shares in Chinese technology companies this year, as plenty shares were bought of the mobile security software makers, Netqin Mobile and 21Vianet Group. Symantec has already invested $150 million in the company owing a 49 percent stake in Huawei-Symantec Inc. It also reserves the right of buying 2 percent more for $28 million, which it might, exercise year.
Salem has faced a lot of pressure by the investors over the past years, to split up the Symantec storage and security divisions. Though he declared he has no such intentions at all, saying "Some of the products that the activists want us to get rid of are central to dealing with growth and data."
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