Analyst Upgrades

• Home Depot (HD) to buy from neutral at Goldman.
• Delta Air Lines (DAL) to buy from neutral at BofA/Merrill.
• Heico (HEI) to outperform from sector perform at RBC Capital.
• Royal Dutch Shell (RDS.A) to outperform from neutral at Credit Suisse.
• MB Financial (MBFI) to outperform from neutral at RW Baird.
• Quest Diagnostics (DGX) to equal weight from underweight at Morgan Stanley.
• Oshkosh (OSK) to neutral from underweight at JPMorgan.
• Volterra (VLTR) and Silicon Laboratories (SLAB) to buy from neutral at Roth Capital.
• Ascena Retail Group (ASNA) to overweight from neutral at Piper Jaffray.
• Cytec Industries (CYT) to buy from hold at Deutsche Bank.

Analyst Upgrades

• Heico (HEI) to outperform from market perform at FBR Capital.
• Eaton (ETN), Silgan Holdings (SLGN), MYR Group (MYRG) and Shaw Group (SHAW) to outperform from neutral at RW Baird.
• Infosys (INFY) to buy from Neutral at Nomura.
• Isle of Capri (ISLE) to buy from neutral at Merriman.
• NovaGold (NG) to sector perform from underperform at RBC Capital.
• CarMax (KMX) and Rockwell Collins (COL) to outperform from neutral at Credit Suisse.
• DHT Holdings (DHT) to overweight from neutral at JPMorgan.
• Cabot Oil & Gas (COG) to overweight from underweight at Morgan Stanley.

Tech sector IPOs surged by a factor of five in terms of value from 2008 to 2009. A mere $749.2 million raised in 2008 jumped to $3.8 million so far this year, according to data from Thomson Reuters. In 2008, only three went public, while 10 tech companies made the plunge in 2009. And, expectations are even higher for 2010.

Paul Bard, a research analyst at Renaissance Capital, forecasts between 40 and 50 tech industry IPOs next year, in which $4 billion to $5 billion in capital would be raised. "We've been expecting an uptick in technology because it has really been underrepresented in the market over the last few years," says Bard. The IPO market for high-tech companies was strong in 2007, but it seized up along with virtually every other form of capital raising when the financial crisis erupted in 2008.

Going into its IPO, investors were expecting nice gains from Emdeon. Well, the company did not disappoint. Last night, the company priced 23.7 million shares at $15.50 (this was an 11% increase in the number of shares). It was at the top of its $13.50-$15.50 range.

Emdeon runs a sophisticated platform that connects payers, providers and patients in the US healthcare system (built over the past 25 years). Yes, in light of the proposed reforms from the Obama Administration, this is certainly an attractive space. After all, a big goal is to find ways to cut costs -- and technology should be a key.

Despite various reforms, health care still represents a growing part of the U.S. economy -- consuming about 16% or $2.1 trillion of GDP. In fact, the growth rate is expected to be about 6.7% per year until 2017 (amounting to $4.3 trillion or 20% of GDP).

A big component of these expenditures is administration (representing about $360 billion or so). And, this is what Emdeon is focused on. The company has recently filed to go public.

Basically, Emdeon provides revenue and payment cycle management solutions. This involves connecting payers, providers and patients. Some of the capabilities include pre-care patient eligibility and benefits verification, claims management and adjudication, payment distribution, payment posting and denial management, and patient billing and payment collection.

All in all, Emdeon has built a solid platform. Last year, revenues came to $808.5 million, with adjusted EBITDA of $182.8 million (90% to 95% of revenues are recurring in nature). The company's system processed 3.7 billion transactions last year.

Emdeon is backed by two major private equity firms: General Atlantic and Hellman & Friedman LLC. And the lead underwriter is Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS).

You can locate the prospectus at the SEC website.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He is also the founder of BizEquity, a valuation website.