With billions in the bank and a broad technology platform, Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) has been fairly clear that a big priority is M&A. And this week, we got another deal: the $105 million purchase of Tidal Software.
Tidal develops sophisticated data center software solutions -- helping to manage diverse applications, such as from Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL), SAP (NYSE: SAP) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT).
Of course, Tidal's business is a nice complement for Cisco, which is getting aggressive in the server market.
No doubt, a key to Tidal's success is lowering costs for customers, which is certainly critical in today's market.
I talked to Miko Matsumura, VP and Deputy CTO at Software AG, about the move. He says that the deal is a "very potent combination. It shows that CISCO is serious about dynamic IT driven by the cloud -- for real enterprise applications."
Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook
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