IBM (IBM), EMC (EMC) Set Sights on Bolt-On Cloud Infrastructure Deal (VMW)

International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM) and EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) may be vying for one of the best, privately-held database web hosting companies out there.

According to Reuters, Dallas,Texas-based SoftLayer might have drawn the attention after AT&T (NYSE: T) signaled interest in the company recently. SoftLayer has since tapped the talents of Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse to advise on a potential sale process.

SoftLayer might draw more than $2 billion in a takeover, sources said. AT&T is no longer in talks to acquire the company.

With EMC owning about 80 percent of VMware (NYSE: VMW) and IBM spending billions on building-out its own cloud infrastructure, it would be interesting to see what SoftLayer would add to the mix. Notably, VMware announced build-out plans for its virtualization software along with the VMware NSX product line.

Traders might keep an eye on Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN), which has become a prominent player in enterprise cloud storage and hosting, not to mention that Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) are both looking to grab larger chunks of the market.

EMC is up while IBM is indicated lower early Friday.

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