Brussels, 28/07/2008 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 25 July the European Commission has cleared the proposed acquisition of EDS by Hewlett-Packard (HP), both US-based companies active in the IT services sector. HP is an information technology company supplying hardware, services and software to consumers, businesses and institutions globally. EDS is an information technology services company supplying business solutions worldwide.
The Commission concluded that the concentration, which focuses on the supply of IT services and in particular on the provision of IT management services, did not raise any competition concerns both globally or in the (European Economic Area) EEA. In the IT services sector there are a large number of global and regional competitors capable of exercising competitive constraints on the merged company. Given that HP is also active in hardware and software, the Commission investigated the effects of the proposed concentration on sales of hardware (such as servers and storage solutions) and software, both components in the provision of IT services, and found no competition concerns. (A.B./trans/rh)