| Reading the article, the alternatives were - Apple (no offer finalized) - Ansa (to merge for an IPO in the fall, to be done by Alex. Brown at a $75 million value) - a “firm” offer from Borland to acquire Forethought for $18 million in cash, with action absolutely guaranteed within the week (never happened) - an immensely complex offer from Xerox (after hours of negotiations) for exclusive sales rights to PowerPoint, for which they would pay something above $18 million So, that’s “no offer”, an offer to merge at some later time with another company, a non existent option to sell the entire company for about what Microsoft offered for PowerPoint alone, and one offer to sell the sales rights. It seems Xerox was the only real alternative. Reading between the lines, that would have cost quite a bit more in legal fees than Microsoft’s offer, and would mean Forethought would have to keep paying for development of the product (in exchange for a part of the revenues) I can see why they went for the simpler option. |