Walt Disney has agreed to buy filmmaker George Lucas's Lucasfilm Ltd and the "Star Wars" franchise for $4.05 billion in cash and stock, a blockbuster deal that adds one of the most beloved franchises in entertainment history to Disney's lineup.
Long torn between whether it should focus on media content or on tools and technologies, Yahoo under Marissa Mayer is being positioned firmly in the latter camp, according to sources inside and outside the company.
Last week, Warren Buffett moved to save Media General, paying $142 million to buy 63 of its struggling newspapers. The move helps backstop the newspaper industry, giving it breathing room to figure out a way to survive in the Internet age.
Diamond Foods is buying the Pringles brand of chips from Procter & Gamble for $1.5 billion. The deal is the latest -- and biggest -- of a stack of acquisitions for the maker of Emerald nuts and Pop Secret popcorn, making Diamond to the No. 2 snack company after PepsiCo's Frito-Lay.
GSI Commerce, which operates websites for big retailers such as Toys R Us and Bath and Body Works, is now selling itself. Web marketplace eBay says its buying GSI for a cool $2.4 billion.
Mergers and acquisitions are becoming ever more popular, with activity up 24% in the first two months of this year -- after already growing 23% in 2010. Here's how your portfolio can benefit from this trend.
Warren Buffett recently said he was anxious to pull the trigger on another large deal. Sheldon Liber, who correctly predicted some of Buffett's earlier acquisitions, writes about which company Buffett could acquire next. You heard it here first.
Citigroup has foreclosed on U.K.-based record label EMI Group, taking it back from private-equity firm Terra Firma, which bought EMI from Citigroup for a whopping $4.7 billion in 2007.
The European Commission on Wednesday approved Intel's $7.68 billion acquisition of security-software company McAfee. Regulators had been concerned that the deal would exclude competing software from working with Intel processors, but Intel agreed to maintain interoperability.
Companies such as Duke Energy and DuPont are off and running with megamergers early this year. Even Playboy is among the dealers. And market pros say the trend is far from over. Why are so many U.S. companies tying the knot? Fast growth is hard to come by in any other strategy.
Companies have record amounts of cash to spend: $1.9 trillion. How can they put it to the best use to keep stock markets booming?
Groupon has turned down Google's acquisition offer of roughly $6 billion. It might be holding out for more money, but columnist Alex Salkever thinks it's more likely to be aiming for a big IPO. Here's why he believes its offering could launch a whole new wave of Internet IPOs.
After months of delays, the deal is done: An investment group called Filmyard Holdings is the proud new owner of the storied Miramax Films. The sale was announced back in June, but concerns about bank financing pushed the closing date back until now.
Google has bought speech-synthesis software maker Phonetic Arts and video-distribution technology firm Widevine Technologies, the company announced in blog posts Friday. These firms are the latest to be snapped up as Google continues to buy technology at a rapid pace.
Mellanox Technologies, a maker of networking chips and switches, has agreed to pay $218 million or $8.75 per share for rival Voltaire.
Wireless technology company Novatel has agreed to buy Enfora, a provider of asset management solutions for $64.5 million in cash, in a move to expand its presence into new markets.
Natural gas prices have been persistently sluggish lately, but it looks like deal-making is revving up: The latest offer comes from the CEO of Exco Resources, Douglas Miller, who has offered to buy the energy company for $20.50 per share or about $4.4 billion.
Pre-Paid Legal Services' stock surged today after it announced it was evaluating "strategic alternatives" for the company, including a possible buyout.
General Electric announced today it would shell out $587 million for Clarient, a maker of cancer diagnostic solutions. Clarient shares have soared 33% on the news.
Shares in Massey Energy were climbing today on reports that the coal mining company was "exploring strategic alternatives" -- in other words, a possible sale.
The Darden family, which owns roughly 24% of Quicksilver, has made an overture to take the natural gas firm private. Shares are up on the news, so is there still room to profit on the upside? Actually, it looks like the answer is yes.
H&R Block has been a laggard in its online efforts, while competitor Intuit's TurboTax keeps gaining market share. To start remedying the situation, H&R Block this week agreed to pay $287.5 million for 2SS Holdings, which develops the desktop and online tax-prep software TaxACT.
Giant drugmaker Johnson & Johnson has agreed to buy Dutch vaccine maker Crucell. The deal will give J&J a bigger piece of the vaccine market and better access to emerging markets.
IBM, Oracle, Hewlett Packard and Intel have been on a buying spree of late, and it's virtually guaranteed that they'll be purchasing more companies over the next several months. But which companies will they target next? Here are eight strong possibilities you might want to buy into.
3M is hungry for deals. Last month it bought Cogent and Attenti, and today it announced its purchase of Arizant for $810 milllion. It's deal-making may be a good sign for corporate America.
Convenience-store chain 7-Eleven offered $2 billion to acquire competitor Casey's General Stores, topping a hostile bid by Canada's Alimentation Couche-Tard
Drugmaker Bristol-Myers Squibb plans to buy ZymoGenetics, its partner in developing a hepatitis C treatment, for $885 million. The move is part of a trend of pharmaceutical acquisitions as several big patents face expiration soon.
The bidding war between rival PC makers Dell (DELL) and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) over small data storage company 3Par (PAR) has heated up once again. HP announced Thursday that it is increasing its tender offer to acquire 3Par to $33 per share in cash, or about $2.1 billion. The board of 3Par has determined that HP's revised proposal constitutes a "Superior Proposal" and notified Dell of its intention to terminate its merger agreement with it.
Google is on a shopping spree. In the last month alone, the search giant has snapped up SocialDeck, Angstro, and Slide -- all to help it take on rival Facebook.
