Conner Peripherals Inc and Alps Electric Ltd are teamed in bidding against a consortium of IBM Corp, Quantum Corp, Digital Equipment Corp, NEC Corp, Western Digital Corp and others for the patent portfolio of liquidating PrairieTek Corp, and according to the Wall Street Journal, the Conner-Alps bid of $18m – the value bolstered by Alps offering to forego most of its claims on the assets of PrairieTek, looks likely to succeed unless the consortium, each member of which would have non-exclusive rights to the patents, increases its $9m bid.
