Digital Equipment Corp is not saying just how big a bath it took on the sale of its Ing C Olivetti & Co SpA, but it does say that it wrote down the holding as part of the $380m writedown of intangible assets it took with its fourth quarter figures; DEC paid $287.8m two years ago for the Olivetti shares, which included intangible assets covering the two companies strategic alliance of about $204m; big question marks remain over the future of the alliance with Olivetti, because the Italian is showing signs of wanting to exit the computer market above personal computers and concentrate its efforts on cellular and other telecommunications, and services – DEC would clearly be a potential buyer of what’s left of Olivetti’s systems business, but after two sour European acquisition adventures, would the Maynarder want, and could it afford a third one?
