Trio of Deals: The Information’s Tech Briefing

Monday’s late stock market sell-off halted, at least for a day, what appeared to be a bubble enveloping Wall Street. Even as Covid cases surge, investors had been acting like all was fine. (And one of the trading apps powering the rally, Robinhood, is directly benefiting, as we note below.)

But deal-making hasn’t slowed: Today we had three noteworthy acquisitions in tech, at least two of which bear the imprint of the pandemic. The biggest, chipmaker Analog Devices’ $21 billion purchase of Maxim Integrated, was the latest example of consolidation in the chip world. (See a smart analysis of the deal here.) Second, Hewlett Packard Enterprise is spending $925 million to buy Silver Peak, whose networking software helps applications run better for remote workers—of particular value right now, with many people still working from home.