Teradata buys Aster Data for $263m

The local and international ICT markets were exceptionally quiet last week, with a handful of small acquisitions internationally, including Teradata's purchase of Aster Data.

At home, the re-appointment of Motlatsi Nzeku at Telkom was one of the items that received some local media attention.

* A mixed trading update from MTN.
* The Competition Commission will not refer Mustek's complaint regarding HP's alleged anti-competitive behaviour to the Competition Tribunal.
* Communications minister Roy Padayachie hosted a meeting with senior ICT industry leaders regarding ways to grow the sector and create jobs. The attendance included the CEOs of Vodacom, MTN, and Altech, the chairman of Dimension Data SA and the founder of Sahara Computer, to name but a few.
* Simeka Business Group changed its name to Morvest Business Group.
* Motlatsi Nzeku was named MD of Telkom International.

* The resignation of Raouf Chkir, CEO of Tunisie Telecom, who was only appointed to that position a few weeks ago.

Look out for the appointment of a new CEO at Telkom SA, a move which is rumoured to be imminent.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* ADP acquired AdvancedMD, a provider of practice management and healthcare partners across the US.
* Fiserv bought M-Com, an international mobile banking and payments provider. The former is one of the largest IT services companies in the US.
* Sony purchased Toshiba's non-memory chip plant for $648 million.
* Teradata bought Aster Data, a market leader in data management and advanced analytics for diverse and big data. The deal, worth $263 million (89%), gives Teradata 100% ownership of Aster Data following its 11% investment last September.
* Xerox acquired Company Concept, a UK-based digital imaging company.
* Motorola Mobility invested in Moblyng, a developer of HTML5-based games for mobile devices and social networks.
* Excellent quarterly results from ASM International.
* Good quarterly numbers from Tech Data.
* Satisfactory quarterly results from SFR, Vivendi (back in the black) and Zain.
* Quarterly losses from Novell, Sykes Enterprises and TiVo.
* Leif Johansson was appointed chairman of Ericsson.
* A planned IPO in China by China Mobile.

* International:
* The unloading by Yahoo of its Japanese operation.
* A possible 10% investment by a JP Morgan fund in Twitter.
* South Africa:
* The appointment of a new CEO at Telkom SA, a move which is rumoured to be imminent.

* The latest PC forecasts are down from their previous forecasts, according to Gartner, and growth in 2011 is now expected to be only 387.8 million units. This is a 10.5% increase from 2010, but down from the previous 15.9% projection.
* The worldwide server market grew by 15.3% in Q4 2010 to reach $15 billion, reports IDC.
* According to BMI-TechKnowledge's latest IT services report, Dimension Data was the largest provider of services to the South African market, with 14.8%, followed by Business Connexion and Gijima.

* JSE All share index: Up 1.2%
* Nasdaq: Up 0.1%
* Top SA share movements: CompuClearing (-20%), Dialogue Group (+25%), Huge (+10%), Ideco (+23.1%), Ifca Technologies (+10%), Labat Africa (+11.1%), MICROmega (-16.7%), Net 1 UEPS (-13%), PBT (+18.3%), Stella Vista (-16.7%) and Zaptronix (-25%)

The Wall Street Journal has published its second annual ranking of venture-backed clean-tech companies. Of specific interest to the ICT sector are Opower, at number five, a developer of software for utility companies that helps consumers boost energy-efficiency; SeaMicro, at number seven, a provider of low-power servers for data centres; and Boston-Power, at eight, a maker of lithium-ion batteries.