Marvell Snaps Up Xelerated

Marvell Technology Group Ltd. (Nasdaq: MRVL) has wasted little time in kicking off this year's 100Gbit/s M&A action with the acquisition of network processor specialist Xelerated Inc. for an undisclosed sum.

Marvell believes Xelerated's AX and HX processors and programmable switches will complement its "portfolio of packet processors, ARM-based SoCs, wireless and low-power physical layer devices widely used in infrastructure, data center and enterprise networking equipment," giving it a stronger all-round offer for system vendors targeting the service provider market.

Why this matters
Xelerated is a key specialist in the 100Gbit/s chip sector, so Marvell has catapulted itself to the forefront of that key market.

Xelerated's key rival is EZchip Technologies Ltd. (Nasdaq: EZCH), which has been working with Marvell up to now. So does this signal the end of that relationship? Not according to Marvell, which stated in its official release about the acquisition that it will "continue to work with EZChip on NP-4 and NP-5 processors and is committed to the long term relationship with EZChip."

That Marvell opted to buy Xelerated and not Ezchip might surprise those who expected Marvell to make a processor acquisition following Broadcom Corp. (Nasdaq: BRCM)'s purchase of NetLogic a year ago. (See NetLogic Fits Broadcom's Master Plan.)

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— Ray Le Maistre, International Managing Editor, Light Reading