????昨天上午，EMC同意以670億美元的價格被戴爾收購，不過條款中有“競購”期規定，他們可以在接下來的60天內尋找一個更好的買家。

????很難想象還有哪家公司會有足夠的財力和興趣，開出比戴爾更高的價格，更不用說他們還得花時間去思考更能盈利的公司結構。不過我們至少可以列一下那些可能追求EMC的買家。

????IBM：首先，IBM絕對有這個實力。公司的市值大約是EMC的三倍，擁有的現金超過80億美元。問題在于IBM并不熱衷于超大規模并購。實際上，公司史上最大的一次交易是在2007年以50億美元收購康格諾。

????惠普：惠普實際上在去年就想收購EMC，不過雙方在價格上沒有談攏。與去年談判時相比，EMC的股價（在戴爾宣布收購前）稍有降低，不過惠普的情況也一樣。此外，惠普在談判后還宣布了拆分業務的計劃。很難想象有哪家剛剛花了一年時間進行拆分的企業，會有興趣再進行一年（甚至幾年）的合并工作。

????微軟：考慮到微軟兩年前還為戴爾的買斷提供了資金，他們此時橫插一腳顯然“政治不正確”。不過微軟的首席執行官薩蒂亞·納德拉是一個以公司為先的人，他對不尋常的企業并購也有一定興趣。此外，理論上微軟也有財力掏錢辦成這件事。

????甲骨文：從戰略上看，甲骨文與EMC最為合適，而且他們也有在2004年斥資103億美元收購PeopleSoft的大手筆。不過公司隨后以74億美元收購太陽微系統公司卻收效甚微，這可能讓他們不太敢再收購硬件公司。

????思科：思科是這些公司中最有可能收購EMC的，但概率也不太大。此外，這兩家公司現在還表示他們將在未來繼續合作，這意味著雙方不需要合并就能獲得自己想要的東西。

????亞馬遜：亞馬遜不會全部收購EMC，可能會收購EMC控股的虛擬化解決方案廠商VMware，借此增強自己的云服務領域。已經私有化的戴爾完成這次收購后，Vmware將保持上市不被私有化。不過，亞馬遜也不熱衷于大手筆的收購，他們只有過一次10億美元以上的收購（2009年以12億美元收購Zappos）。

????通用電氣：通用電氣不會收購EMC，不過可能會對EMC擁有的Pivotal感興趣。通用電氣曾經在2010年投資1.05億美元獲得了后者10%的股份。

????私募股權：不可能。私募股權買不起EMC，除非他們設法與EMC的大股東聯合，促使EMC做出結構調整，類似于黑石集團和卡爾·伊坎在2013年收購戴爾的提議。（財富中文網）

????譯者：嚴匡正

????EMC Corp this morning agreed to be taken (mostly) private by Dell Inc. for $67 billion, but included a “go shop” provision whereby it can solicit superior offers for the next 60 days.

????It’s hard to imagine that any other company has both the resources and interest in besting Dell — let alone the time to figure out a more beneficial structure — but we’d be remiss in not at least pointing out the possible suitors for EMC:

????IBM:For starters, IBM certainly has the resources. Its market cap is around three times larger than EMC’s, and it has more than $8 billion in cash on hand. The trouble is that IBM isn’t known for mega-mergers. In fact, its largest-ever purchase was a $5 billion deal for Cognos in 2007.

????Hewlett-Packard:HP actually did try to buy EMC last year, but talks fell apart over price. EMC’s share price (pre-Dell reports) was a bit lower than it was during those discussions, but so is HP’s. Moreover, HP subsequently announced plans to split up its business. Hard to imagine either newly-independent unit would want to follow up a year of separation work with a year (or more) of combination work.

????Microsoft:This one would be politically incorrect given that Microsoft helped bankroll Dell’s own buyout two years ago, but CEO Satya Nadella is an enterprise-first guy who has shown some appetite for unusual M&A activity. Plus, it could literally pay cash for the entire thing.

????Oracle:This may be the strongest strategic fit, and Oracle was willing to pay $10.3 billion for PeopleSoft back in 2004. But its subsequent $7.4 billion purchase of Sun Microsystems was problematic and may have left Oracle nervous about acquiring still more hardware.

????Cisco:Better odds than most other companies on this list, but that’s really not saying too much. Plus, both Cisco and EMC today went out of their way to say that they’ll continue to work together going forward, which would suggest that each side is still getting what it wants from their non-merged relationship.

????Amazon:Again, not a full-scale EMC buyout, but perhaps a cloud unification play for VMware VMW -8.02% , an EMC-controlled virtualization group that will retain a public equity “stub” following the Dell merger. Then again, Amazon isn’t known for big purchases, having only ever bought one company for more than $1 billion (Zappos, for $1.2 billion in 2009).

????General Electric:Not to buy EMC, but perhaps to make a play for EMC-owned Pivotal, in which GE invested $105 million for a 10% stake back in 2010.

????Private equity:Nope. Private equity alone can’t afford this, unless it somehow teams up with a large EMC shareholder to try and force an alternate structure. Kind of like what The Blackstone Group BX -0.91% and Carl Icahn proposed during Dell’s 2013 buyout.