Microsoft makes multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI

Microsoft’s further multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI, and continued examination globally of the practices of the ‘big tech’ boys dominated the technology market last month.

• BCX acquired DotCom Software Projects, a software solutions firm.
• Noodle, a US-based e-learning content provider, bought SA-based Hubble Studios, a global e-learning design firm.
• XContent, a provider of cloud technology solutions, purchased Prince Consulting, a premier provider of business applications solutions.
• South African online payments gateway provider Payfast has undergone a major rebrand.

• Altron has sold its businesses in Botswana and Mozambique to Zimbabwe’s Tano Digital Solutions.
• The Ethiopian Communications Authority has begun the process to identify and license the country’s third telecommunications service operator.

• Akoustis Technologies acquired Grinding and Dicing Services, a provider of premium back-end semiconductor supply chain services.
• Align Capital Partners bought Cleartelligence, a data engineering and analytics consulting firm.
• Amtech Systems purchased Entrepix, a globally recognised expert in chemical mechanical polishing and wafer cleaning.
• UK-based ANS acquired fallen Microsoft partner Preact.
• Ansys bought Engineering Simulation and Scientific Software Rocky DEM, a provider of a discrete element method tool and a skilled team of developers, application support technicians and customer-facing staff in Brazil, Spain and the US.
• Aptum purchased CloudOps, an AWS, Google and Edge-to-Cloud SaaS Orchestrator.
• Arteri acquired Semifore, a provider of hardware/software interface technology.
• ChrysCapital bought Xoriant, a software engineering and digital IT services provider.
• Dell Technologies purchased Israel-based Cloudify, the provider of an open source DevOps automation platform ($100 million).

Payfast has undergone a major rebrand.

• Descartes Systems Group acquired Supply Vision, a provider of shipment management solutions for North American Logistics Services Providers.
• Dye & Durham bought UK-based Insight Legal Software, a legal software firm.
• Israel-based Forter purchased Immue, an Israel-based bot detection start-up.
• Globant acquired Vertic, a Copenhagen and New York-based creative consultancy with a strong focus on life sciences and other B2B disciplines.
• HPE bought Pachyderm, a start-up that delivers software based on open source technology to automate reproducible machine learning pipelines that target large-scale AI applications.
• Integris, a private equity-backed MSP focused on building a national services business, purchased CalTech, a community bank managed services specialist.
• JD Power, a global leader in data analytics and consumer intelligence, acquired ZappyRide, an electric vehicle data company that builds white-label software and tools for automotive OEMs, electric utilities and other greentech stakeholders.
• Microsoft bought Fungible, a developer of composable infrastructure based on the company’s data processing unit, or DPU, hardware for accelerating data centre network and storage performance ($190 million).
• NetEase purchased SkyBox Labs, a Canadian gaming studio best known for co-developing hits including Halo Infinite and Minecraft.
• Permira acquired Acuity Knowledge Partners, a research, analytics and business intelligence company to the financial services sector.
• Servify bought Jubi.ai, an AI-driven engagement platform used to automate customer support and sales.
• Teledyne Technologies purchased Cyprus-based ChartWorld International and affiliates, a provider of digital marine navigation hardware and software.
• Tetra Tech acquired Amyx, a premier enterprise technology services, cyber security and management consulting firm.
• Thoma Bravo bought Magnet Forensics, a Canadian provider of software for military, law enforcement and business customers ($1.3 billion).
• ABB has sold its US-based power conversion business to AcBel Polytech ($505 million).
• Accenture has agreed to acquire SKS Group, a consulting firm that helps banks across Germany, Austria and Switzerland modernise their technology infrastructure and address regulatory requirements using SAP S/4HANA solutions. It has also invested, via Accenture Ventures, in Cosmo Tech, a global provider of digital twin simulation and optimisation technology, and Forma Vision, a provider of live-streamed, volumetric video technology that enables 3D holographic images of people, objects and environments to be beamed into the metaverse from any office, home or other location.
• Alpine Software Group has agreed to acquire Canada-based ThinkLP, a SaaS company that serves retailers' loss prevention departments.
• Ardian will acquire a ±60% stake in Assist Digital, a customer relationship management specialist.
• Atos has entered exclusive negotiations with Mitel Networks for the sale of its unified communications and collaboration services businesses.
• Cerberus Sentinel has signed a definitive agreement for the acquisition of RAN Security, an Argentina-based cyber security company.
• Cognizant has entered into an agreement to acquire UK-based Mobica, an IOT software engineering services provider.
• Confluent has signed a definitive agreement to buy Immerok, a leading contributor to Apache Flink, a powerful technology for building stream processing applications and one of the most popular Apache open source projects.
• Digital Alpha Advisors plans to merge portfolio companies PacketFabric and Unitas Global under the PacketFabric name.
• DoubleDown Interactive has entered into a share purchase agreement to acquire SuprNation, a Sweden-based i-Gaming company providing differentiated casino gaming experiences.
• Duck Creek Technologies has signed a definitive agreement to buy Imburse Payments, a Swiss-based modern payments platform, and it has agreed to be taken private by Vista Equity Partners ($2.6 billion).
• Elliott Management has made a multibillion-dollar investment in Salesforce.
• F5 is purchasing Lilac Cloud, an app delivery company.
• FIT (Foxconn Interconnect Technology), a subsidiary of the Foxconn Group (Hon Hai Precision Technology), has entered into an agreement to acquire SWH Group, a developer and manufacturer of sensor, connectivity and electrification solutions.
• Google lost its fight in India's Supreme Court to block an anti-trust order, in a major setback that will force the US tech giant to change the business model of its popular Android operating system in a key growth market.
• HPE intends to sell its 49% stake in its H3C Chinese enterprise IT joint venture.
• The announcement by InterDigital that a UK court has reconfirmed the company's litigation against Lenovo Group for infringing a valid and essential InterDigital cellular patent.
• Ireland's data privacy regulator has fined Meta €390 million for breaches at its Facebook and Instagram services and said both must reassess the legal basis on how they run advertising based on personal data in the EU.
• Lead, an edtech unicorn, has entered into a definitive agreement with British educational services company Pearson to acquire its K-12 India business.
• Microsoft will make a further multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI, deepening ties with the start-up behind the chatbot sensation ChatGPT. It is also investing in Paige, an AI pathology start-up.
• Micross Components has signed a definitive agreement to purchase the high-reliability DC-DC converter business of Infineon Technologies, a global semiconductor leader in power systems and IOT.
• Navitas Semiconductor has agreed to acquire the remaining minority interest in its silicon control IC joint venture from Halo Microelectronics.
• Singapore-based Novo Tellus Capital Partners has bought a controlling stake in SP Manufacturing, an electronics manufacturing company.
• Nuvei has signed an agreement to purchase Paya Holdings, which provides integrated payment and commerce solutions for North American merchants ($1.3 billion).
• Progress Software has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire MarkLogic, a leader in managing complex data and metadata.
• Qlik intends to buy Talend, which would bring together two Thoma Bravo-backed industry leaders with a shared focus on adding value to data to deliver business outcomes for customers.
• Semantix has agreed to acquire Elemeno, a cloud-managed machine learning operations platform provider.
• Snowflake, the data cloud company, has signed a definitive agreement to purchase SnowConvert, the premier suite of tools for efficiently migrating databases to the data cloud, from Mobilize.Net.
• The US’s DOJ is suing Microsoft for alleged abuse of dominance in online advertising technology.
• Verinext, the new name for the game-changing Anexinet-Veristor merger, has been officially launched, thus kicking off a new era in “what’s next” solutions from the full-service digital transformation powerhouse.
• Vista Equity Partners has sold a majority stake in software company Zapproved, which serves corporate legal teams, to Leeds Equity Partners-backed Exterro.
• Vodafone has agreed on the sale of its Hungarian business to local IT company 4iG and the Hungarian state (€1 billion).
• The $966.27 million investment by Singapore’s GIC and Saudi Arabia’s PIF in Kakao Entertainment.
• The $177.6 million investment led by National Green Development Fund in Yuzi Semiconductor, an N-type silicone wafer maker.
• The $104 million investment led by Silversmith Capital Partner in Impel, which creates software for the automotive industry.
• The €100 million investment led by Temasek in Pasqal, a France-based developer of programmable quantum simulators and computers.
• The appointments of new CEOs at Appgate, BharatPe, Cognizant Technology Solutions, ConvergeOne, Entravision Communications (interim), Forescout, Frequency Electronics, ITU, Kimball Electronics, Marqeta, Pintec, SatixFy, Texas Instruments, the dSPACE group, Udemy, Vertiv, Visionary Education Technology Holdings Group and Workday.
• The deaths of Walter Ulloa, founder, chairman and CEO of Entravision Communications, and Sim Wong Hoo, founder of Creative Technology.
• IPO filings from Ionos (Frankfurt), Hesai Technology (Nasdaq) and MEEZA (Qatar).

• According to Gartner, worldwide IT spending is projected to total $4.5 trillion in 2023, an increase of 2.4% from 2022. This is down from the previous quarter’s forecast of 5.1% growth.
• According to Gartner, worldwide PC shipments totalled 65.3 million units in Q422, a 28.5% decrease from Q421. This marks the largest quarterly shipment decline since Gartner began tracking the PC market in the mid-1990s. For the year, PC shipments reached 286.2 million units in 2022, a 16.2% decrease from 2021.
• According to Gartner, worldwide semiconductor revenue increased 1.1% in 2022 to total $601.7 billion, up from $595 billion in 2021. The combined revenue of the top 25 semiconductor vendors increased 2.8% in 2022 and accounted for 77.5% of the market.
• According to IDC, digital transformation investments in the META region are set to more than double across the 2021-2026 period and are forecast to accelerate at a CAGR of 16% over the five-year period, topping $74 billion in 2026 and accounting for 43.2% of all ICT investments made that year.
• According to IDC, worldwide shipments of used smartphones, including officially refurbished and used smartphones, will reach 282.6 million units in 2022. The unit growth represents an 11.5% increase over the 253.4 million units shipped in 2021. This growth is expected to continue as IDC forecasts used smartphone shipments will reach 413.3 million units in 2026 with a CAGR of 10.3% from 2021 to 2026.
• According to IDC, global shipments for traditional PCs fell below expectations in 4Q22 as 67.2 million PCs were shipped, down 28.1% from the prior year.
• According to IDC, worldwide smartphone shipments declined 18.3% year-over-year to 300.3 million units in 4Q22.

• JSE All share index: Up 10.6%
• FTSE100: Up 4.2%
• DAX: Up 8.8%
• NYSE (Dow): Up 2.5%
• S&P 500: Up 5.2%
• Nasdaq: Up 11%
• Nikkei225: Up 4.9%
• Hang Seng: Up 14.7%
• Shanghai: Up 5.7%

Look out for the merger of Western Digital and Japan's Kioxia Holdings; Sumo Logic being acquired by one of the major PE companies; and the US’s DOJ activity regarding Google’s ad dominance.