More M&A: IBM snarfs up Texas Memory Systems

We knew that TMS was looking for a buyer. And IBM is a very intelligently run company, they see how the technologies are changing. IBM has grabbed TMS. This alters a bunch of playing fields. There are a shrinking pool of players out there available. Virident, STEC, and a few others. OCZ is occasionally rumored to be talking to Seagate and others. With TMS, IBM can now offer TMS metadata servers for GPFS, integrated. This is HUGE for IBM. And it cuts a few companies out of the loop (sadly hitting one of our siFlash markets) if they do it right. They can integrate this into whatever XIV/SONAS has become. Etc. This places Oracle, Dell, and HP at a disadvantage. If I were a betting man, I’d bet several phone calls are going out to a few other companies right now from one of the above group. The implications in HPC are interesting ala GPFS. In storage in general. But this also subtly alters the landscape and potential future paths for competitors. Again, this is not the last of the M&A;, not by a long shot.