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2004 Top Ten: Mergers & Acquisitions: Page 4 of 6

SAN-testing equipment maker Finisar Corp. (Nasdaq: FNSR) made a splash with its $263 million bid for Infineon Technologies AG's (NYSE/Frankfurt: IFX) fiber-optics business, a deal whose value was revised downward by about 18 percent six months later. This topped off Finisar's other 2004 acquisitions of Honeywell International Inc.'s (NYSE: HON) VCSEL unit and Data Transit Corp. (see Finisar Buys Honeywell VCSEL Biz and Finisar Buys Again).

No. 4: No Brainer: Veritas Buys KVS

Way back in August, when it was the predator rather than prey, Veritas scooped up email archiving leader KVS Inc. for $225 million. This plugged a big hole in the Veritas product line at the time, signifying the coming-of-age for archiving and compliance vendors.

No. 3: EMC Gets Smarts

EMC's shored up its software portfolio with this week's $260 million purchase of Smarts, a maker of network correlation software. EMC plans to apply these tools to storage environments. While it pales in comparison to the $3 billion-plus spending spree for Documentum, Legato, and VMWare, the Smarts deal does fuel a reinvigorated race with Veritas.