EMC offers to purchase Data Domain for $1.8B in cash

It probably feels pretty good to be sitting over at Data Domain (NASDAQ:DDUP) right now.

EMC (NYSE:EMC) just announced a $30/share (approx $1.8B) cash acquisition offer representing a 20% premium over the NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) offer of late May. Cha-ching! But will Data Domain take the higher offer? .... and what would a future as part of EMC look like?

Or, does the price for NetApp simply go up? With its in-line deduplication, Data Domain is considered an innovative leader and pioneer in the rapid growth disk-based backup and archive industry. Clearly, their product portfolio would complement either EMC or NetApp. But each have their unique characteristics. EMC comes with acquisition experience and a broad product portfolio across the information life cycle (including an existing deduplication acquisition, Avamar, in 2006). NetApp has grown from its NAS beginnings to a storage industry leader and lauded for its flexible "Data ONTAP" architecture.

It will be interesting to see how this unfolds.

Data Domain’s recent financial highlights:

- 2008 Revenue reached $274MM, more than double 2007’s $124MM
- 2008 Net Income $21.6MM (7.8%)
- Total Assets of $400MM, Total Equity $290MM (q1 09)
- Q1 09 Revenue $79MM -- Projected $375MM for 2009.
- Q1 09 Cash from Operations $11MM