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.

In the past, it has been the Nintendo (OTC: NTDOY) Wii or Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone creating holiday hype -- what product will it be this year?

Quite honestly, none. The tech realm is still looking for the next big holiday hit. This is why it appears that we could be facing a holiday season full of buy-one-get-one-free specials or pushy salespeople trying to get you to allow their company to install the new flat-panel TV or add ons that will help integrate your home entertainment system.

So, what does this mean for electronics retailers?

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says Cisco's earnings are supposed to be spectacular. If they're not, you can expect a quick sell-off.

I do not envy John Chambers. He's given out tons of interviews in the past few weeks on all sorts of big-think business topics. He has seen his stock go from being liked to almost universally loved by the analyst community. Numbers have been raised, target prices bumped, recommendations turned even more bullish than in past quarters.

And tonight when Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO) (Cramer's Take) reports, Chambers has to live up to that billing.

Is he being set up to fail? I like Cisco very much, and have ever since it became clear to me that the Mobile Internet Tsunami is going to be the biggest trend since the Net itself and the personal computer beforehand. Cisco's got its tentacles in every single part of the enterprise.

Wondering which sector is performing the best during the current economic crunch? The kind folks at MarketWatch provided the answer: technology. Nick Godt notes that the sector has gained strength from "investors playing an uncertain environment as both a defensive and a cyclical sector." For the month, tech is only 1.4% lower - winning it the coveted title of the best of the worst for February. The article adds that tech was followed closely by healthcare, "the most traditional defensive sector," with a loss of 1.6%.

Shares of one-time tech stalwart, Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) soared more than 20% yesterday after the computer server and software company posted better-than-expected results for its second fiscal quarter of 2009, which ended Dec. 28, 2008.

Sun said it lost $208 million, or 28 cents per share, in the quarter, but absent one-time items it would have earned $114 million, or 15 cents per share. Revenue was $3.22 billion. Analysts surveyed by FactSet Research expected the company to lose 13 cents per share on revenue of $3.11 billion.

This post is part of a series featuring bargain stocks that are worth a look now. See more Cheap Stocks.

Tech stocks are taking a beating lately, as more and more companies scale back on their IT spending. While it may be foolhardy to bet on any significant short-term rallies for this struggling group, there's probably no better time than the present to dive into a long-term play. With BMC Software (NYSE: BMC) approaching key support levels, this is one stock worth looking into.

While many major technology concerns have provided weak or slashed forecasts for the coming quarters (Cisco, anyone?), BMC recently raised its fiscal 2008 earnings guidance. The company now expects fiscal-year profits of $2.15 to $2.25 per share, up from its previous outlook of $2.10 to $2.20 per share. BMC also exceeded second-quarter profit expectations in its October 30 report -- overall, this is one tech name that's no slouch in the earnings department.

With BMC holding up strong in a tough environment, it's no wonder that Raymond James analyst Michael Turits recently upgraded the shares from Outperform to Strong Buy. "We expect ... BMC to continue to benefit from the relative resilience of the mainframe market," Turits wrote in a note to clients, adding that "customers at the [CA World] conference indicated no slowing in mainframe capacity growth planning."

My recent Investing in Oregon post took a look at some companies that the Motley Fool had featured in its investigation of investment opportunities in the Beaver State, including Precision Castparts Corp. (NYSE: PCP), StanCorp Financial Group Inc. (NYSE: SFG), FLIR Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: FLIR), and Columbia Sportswear Co. (NASDAQ: COLM).

But the Motley Fool article also mentioned that one of the most prominent business influences in Oregon wasn't even headquartered in the state: semiconductor giant Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) from Santa Clara, California. It also included mention of four Oregon-based businesses that provided support for Intel: Tektronix Inc. (NYSE: TEK), Mentor Graphics Corp. (NASDAQ: MENT), Triquint Semiconductor Inc. (NASDAQ: TQNT), and Electro Scientific Industries Inc. (NASDAQ: ESIO). One could imagine that Intel's impressive earnings report this week should have been good news for these supporting companies.

Beaverton-based Tektronix, widely known as Tek, is one of the leading makers of test and measurement equipment, such as digital multimeters, logic analyzers, and curve tracers, and oscilloscopes. Tek will win its seventh technical Emmy this year. Tek beat Wall Street expectations in its previous three quarters, reporting earnings per share of 40 cents for its first quarter FY2008. But the consensus of analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial was to hold shares of Tek. The share price reached a 52-week high of $37.95 on Monday when it was announced that Danaher Corp. (NYSE: DHR) will acquire Tek. Tool and equipment maker Danaher just announced record third quarter results.

International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM) isn't on Wall Street's good graces these days. Big Blue posted decent fourth-quarter results yesterday but Wall Street expected better than the 11 percent profit growth and 7.5 percent jump in revenue.

Think Equity analyst Eric Ross told clients that IBM's results were helped by a lower-than-expected tax rate and that investors were expecting the technology giant to "handily beat consensus estimates," according to Reuters. Shares fell 4 percent.

Hardware was an area of concern to investors. Revenue from IBM's Systems and Technology group, which includes servers, storage and its Microelectronics business, rose 3 percent to $7.1 billion.

Since companies can now upgrade their systems with software, they have less need for expensive hardware. That's causing sales of large computers to slow, which is a negative trend for the company, IBM shareholder Pat Becker of Becker Capital Management told Bloomberg News.

As Eric Buscemi points out, investors also are worried about IBM's services business, which had long-term bookings that were disappointing.

IBM has been tops in patent awards for years.. Now, would be a good time to lock some of those geeks in a room to inspire them to come up with the next big thing.

Until then, Wall Street will be keeping its distance from IBM.