ROUND ROCK, Texas (AP) — Dell is walking away from a bidding contest with rival Hewlett-Packard for data-storage maker 3Par.
Dell Inc. says it will not match Hewlett-Packard Co.'s offer to pay $33 per share for 3Par Inc., or about $2.07 billion.
Dave Johnson, Dell's senior vice president for corporate strategy, says the company "took a measured approach throughout the process and have decided to end these discussions."
Dell boosted its offer to $32 Wednesday from $27, but before it could be made public, HP again raised the stakes Thursday morning.
Both PC makers were looking at 3Par as a way to build up their "cloud computing" businesses, delivering software, data storage and other services to customers via the Internet. 3Par could also help them cut data storage expenses.
