A monster bid in the computer peripherals sector is on the way from Softbank Corp of Tokyo – but no-one knows where to look. The company announced on Friday that it was seeking some $630m after expenses in an issue of new shares (see page five) – and says all the money is wanted to cover part of the cost of the planned acquisition. It says it is in talks with the unidentified company – and that it will be raising more than twice as much as the $630m from other sources for the acquisition, so we are talking some $2,000m. It is not even known whether Softbank, which bought the Comdex exhibitions last year, is buying someone like Alps Electric Ltd or Wearnes Group Pvt Ltd, or a US company, although there has been talk that Quantum Corp is seeking a cash injection. But most of Quantum’s disks are made by a Matsushita Electric Industrial Co affiliate, and so that would be the obvious first port of call for cash.
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