IBM reportedly pulls out of Sun deal

Vendors fail to agree on price over the weekend

Sun’s board said it would no longer negotiate with IBM exclusively

Big Blue has reportedly withdrawn its offer to acquire Sun Microsystems after the companies failed to agree on the $7bn (£4.7bn) deal over the weekend.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Sun felt the deal gave IBM too much leeway to abandon it. Meanwhile the New York Times claimed there were other issues at stake, such as contracts with Sun executives and managers and senior engineers that made Sun more expensive than IBM had predicted.

It appears the vendors failed to agree a price, which IBM reportedly had dropped from $10 to $11 per share three weeks ago to $9.40 in the past few days.

According to a report from the Associated Press IBM walk away from the deal when Sun’s board said it would no longer negotiate with IBM exclusively.