Last week, Dell cranked its wallet wide open and announced its intention to buy up a company called “3Par” for $1.15 billion. Putting 3Par under the Dell umbrella would buff up the high-end storage and large-scale backup side of its business and give companies like IBM and HP a new competitor to worry about. The purchase looked similar to a deal it cut in 2008, when it forked over $1.4 billion for EqualLogic, as well as its Ocarina Networks buy just last month, though the terms of that one were left undisclosed.
