A company spokesman says the acquisition "will significantly expand Novell's ability to deliver on its one Net vision of the Internet by enabling customers to quickly develop business applications that exploit the latest Web technologies while leveraging existing IT investments." The Provo, Utah-based company acquired Cambridge Technology Partners in Cambridge, Massachusetts last year and has established an executive office there.

The company, which has over 6,500 employees around the world, also has an office in Wellesley, MA and according to Gary Schuster, spokesperson for Novell, Novel will consolidate those two offices in a site in Waltham on Wyman St. Shuster tells GlobeSt.com that the company will relocate there after the first of the year but he was unclear exactly how much space Novell would be taking. "We are still in the middle of figuring that out," he says. A representative of Cambridge Technology Partners tells GlobeSt.com that there are about 150 employees in its Cambridge office.

Novell says that SilverStream's offices will remain in Billerica. According to local published reports the company is considering moving its headquarters to the area but Shuster dismisses those rumors. "The headquarters will not be moving," he maintains.Under terms of the agreement, Novell will commence a cash tender offer to acquire all of the outstanding shares of SilverStream common stock at a price of $9 per share. Assuming a closing of the acquisition in this July, the total cash acquisition price before acquisition fees will be approximately $212 million. In that event, cash on SilverStream's balance sheet is expected to total approximately $100 million, which would yield a net cash outlay by Novell of approximately $112 million. SilverStream will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Novell.

Jack Messman, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Novell, stresses that the acquisition helps position the company to compete in the Web services market. "We promised we'd move aggressively into the Web Services space. With the acquisition of SilverStream, we will have not only achieved that goal, we will have jumped ahead of the competition," he says.

Chris Stone, vice chairman in the office of the CEO at Novell, says, "This acquisition will make Novell a meaningful player in the web services game, right next to others who are pursuing a services strategy, like IBM, Microsoft and Sun."