As wacky as this sounds, there is some logic behind it.... ;-)

they should not do software anymore. the acquisition of Cognos was a mistake. lets hope they don't do the same with SAP

anyway, with a, say, 20% premium that would put the price tag on SAP to allmost 80 billion. Maybe M$ has that kind of cash IBM does not.

So if Microsoft want SAP does that suggest that SAP are a threat to Microsoft? After all, without Applications to run on, what good is Windows and with OS Agnosticity rendering Software and Hardware combinations and intercompatibility more and more a matter of personal subjective Taste/Style, having something for Systems to do is the neXXXXt Big thing?

Why sell out whenever you are in the driving seat and the race is yet to be run ..... unless of course, you still get to drive races all of the races, as you see fit, with sourcing from all sources ...... which would make it very attactive to any Predator/Shark/MetaDataMiner?