Phone company CenturyLink Inc (CTL.N) plans to buy Savvis Inc (SVVS.O) for about $2.5 billion in cash and stock to beef up its data center business as it looks to cash in on increasing demand for so-called cloud services. The deal comes at a time when regional phone companies like CenturyLink, which acquired rival Qwest for $10.6 billion earlier this month, are looking at ways to boost their business as consumers continue to disconnect home phones in favor of Internet services and cellphones. The Savvis buy, announced on Wednesday, will help CenturyLink boost its data centers, which are large warehouses filled with computer storage servers. They are key to cloud services, which help companies cut costs by hosting software and computers at large-scale remote data centers which consumers can access via the Internet. Data center operators have seen a spurt of recent deals in the recent past, including Verizon Communications' (VZ.N) $1.4 billion purchase of Terremark Worldwide.
CenturyLink, Inc., formerly CenturyTel, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, is an integrated communications company engaged primarily in providing a range of communications services, including local and long distance voice, wholesale local network access, high-speed Internet access, other data services and video services. Shares of CTL fell by 0.86% or $-0.345/share to $39.975. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $14.16 and as high as $46.87. On average, 4778170 shares of CTL exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 2131973.
SAVVIS, Inc. (SAVVIS) provides information technology (IT), services including cloud services, managed hosting, managed security, colocation, professional services, and network services, through its global infrastructure to businesses and government agencies around the world. Shares of SVVS traded higher by 8.86% or $3.19/share to $39.21. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $14.47 and as high as $37.98. On average, 937625 shares of SVVS exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 14566362.
Verizon Communications Inc. (Verizon) is a holding company. Shares of VZ traded higher by 1.44% or $0.542/share to $38.172. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $25.99 and as high as $38.95. On average, 16129100 shares of VZ exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 3857079.
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