Acquisition boom

* Sun Microsystems bought Storage Technology for $4.1 billion. This is yet another large acquisition involving a storage company and is likely to be the prop Sun needs to bolster its sagging growth. It also integrates well into Sun`s portfolio and provides a powerful system combination in-house.
* Lawson Software`s recent acquisition of Intentia denudes the European ERP market of all the key ERP players, except for SAP. We have already seen the swallowing/merging of Baan, Infor, JBA and Scala into bigger entities over the past few months/years.

* Excellent interim numbers from Stella Vista with revenue substantially up and back in the black.
* A good set of maiden full-year figures from Alliance Data with revenue and profit both up.
* A mediocre set of year-end numbers from Synergy with net profits well down and revenue also down.
* An interim loss from Sekunjalo, although revenue well up.
* Positive trading updates from FrontRange and MTN.
* Grintek`s 25% investment in CyberSim.
* Nokusa Investments` 25% investment in Multimatics.
* The appointment of Gys Hyman as MD of Ovations and Makhuparetja Nyama as acting CEO at Grintek.
* Phoenix Global Software was appointed as distributor for OnSpeed.

* Tarsus Technologies established a team dedicated to its expansion into Africa.
* Dimension Data`s 51% investment in Roe, a Nigerian IT solutions and services company, to create Dimension Data Nigeria.
* The creation of a consortium involving Vodacom and Virgin for a bid for a controlling stake in Nigeria`s V-Mobile.

Lawson Software`s recent acquisition of Intentia denudes the European ERP market of all the key ERP players, except for SAP.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* L-3 Communications Holdings acquired Titan.
* Lawson Software took over Intentia International AB.
* Citrix Systems acquired NetScaler.
* Ericsson sold its stake in digital pen company, Anoto Group AB.
* The appointments of Harry Debes as president and CEO of Lawson Software, Gary Gist as chairman of Intersil, Gregory Schott as chairman of VerticalNet and Jack Waterman as CEO of VitalStream.
* The resignations of Jay Coughlan, president and CEO of Lawson Software, Michael Hagan as chairman of VerticalNet and Jerry Meerkatz as CEO of Infowave.
* Analyst upgrades for ADC Telecommunications, Agere Systems, Aladdin Knowledge Systems, Amdocs, Amkor Technology, Aspect Communications, Axcelis Technologies, Blue Coat Systems, Chordiant Software, Ciena, eBay, JDA Software, LSI Logic, LTX, O2Micro International, On Semiconductor, Secure Computing, Storage Technology and Symantec.
* Analyst downgrades for Agile Software, Cognos, Computer Associates, Comtech Telecommunications, Digital Insight, Ditech Communications, Entravision Communications, Getty Images, Hyperion Solutions, Lawson Software, Navarre, Qwest Communications, SiRF Technology, Tibco Software, Varian Semiconductor and Vasco Data Security.
* Negative result warnings from Cognos, Danka Business Systems, EDS, InterVoice, Plantronics, Take-Two Interactive Software and Tibco.
* Stock repurchase announcements from API Electronics, AsiaInfo and Speedus.
* A job loss announcement from Open Source Development Labs.
* Private funding obtained for Become, the company behind the search engine, Become.com; ONStor, a network storage management vendor; Rivermine, a business application provider for telecommunications management; SpikeSource, an open source services start-up; TensorComm, a wireless technology company; and Ygnition, a VOIP provider.
* A stock offering announcement by Corning.
* A share split announcement from Vignette (reverse 1:10).
* A planned IPO from Inmarsat in London, which would be the largest in the UK for over 12 months (about lb690 million).
* IPO filings from Activant Solutions, a provider of business management software, and VistaPrint, a supplier of graphic design services.

According to IDC, the worldwide external disk market for Q105 grew by 6.7% from the previous year to $3.8 billion, slightly more than the total disk storage systems market. EMC headed the former and HP the latter, re the top revenue earners.

* JSE All share index: Up 4.5%
* Nasdaq: Up 1.2%
* Top SA share movements: Alliance Data (+18%), Faritec (-25.9%), I-Solutions (-33.3%), Infowave (-23.9%), Labat Africa (-25.3%), Metrofile (+18.5%), Square One (+20%), Vesta (-66.7%), Y3K (+26.9%) and Zaptronix (+22.2%).
* Top international share movements: Amkor Technology (+41.8%), Blue Coat Systems (+39.8%), Com21 (-66.7%), Daisytek International (-53.3%), Dobson Communications (+42.2%), Dataram (+39.5%), Internet Business Group (+50%), Island Pacific (+30.3%), Pace Micro Technology (+68.8%) and Ultimate Electronics (+45.8%).

The latest edition of BusinessWeek focuses on the Stars of Europe, the 25 leaders at the forefront of change. Included in this list are Tomasz Sielicki, president of ComputerLand Poland; Ben Verwaayen, CEO of BT Group; and Niklas Zennstrom, CEO and co-founder of Skype.