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Dell bidding war afoot as Blackstone Group and Carl Icahn both make offers (update: confirmed)
Thought that Dell buy out was a done deal? Well, the Blackstone Group and investor Carl Icahn clearly don't think so, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that both have contacted the committee of Dell's board just before Friday's shutoff deadline. The would-be bidders are reported to be working on their actual offer amounts, and in the process buying them four more days thinking time. Reuters reports that Blackstone's tentative offer is already in, according to sources, but at this time the company is yet to comment. Despite a recent slump in profits, Michael Dell surprised many when he announced his intention to buy back the eponymous firm in a deal with Microsoft for $24.4 billion. So, if the founder thought he had the keys to the old estate back, he might just have to wait a little longer. Update: The rumors were true, and now there's a PR to prove it. The Blackstone Group and Carl Icahn have indeed both made offers, and "Michael Dell has confirmed to the Committee his willingness to explore in good faith the possibility of working with third parties regarding alternative acquisition proposals."
Blizzard's Project Blackstone is a Heart of the Swarm viral campaign
Blizzard Entertainment registered a site called ProjectBlackstone.com late last year, and fans wondered if maybe it might be related to the mysterious upcoming Blizzard project code-named Titan. But no such luck, it seems: The domain went live this week and, soon after that, some crafty Redditors found the password. (It's "Y7_$0>0k_3<$m," if you want to try it yourself). The whole campaign has been revealed as a Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm tie-in.Opening the site up reveals emails between various Terran characters talking about experimenting on Zerg lifeforms and presumably we'll see updates in the future that will fill out the story heading into the new game. Heart of the Swarm, the second part of the trilogy that Blizzard's Starcraft 2 has become, is due out on March 12.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Blizzard snags Project Blackstone domain name
Titan, is that you? We can't say whether or not Blizzard is getting close to revealing its top-secret game project, but the studio did secure an interesting domain name this week. On November 26th, Blizzard Entertainment registered ProjectBlackstone.com and opened the door to all kinds of speculation of what it may be. If it is Blizzard's next MMO or franchise, the name alone is one of the most solid pieces of news that we've seen in years. The studio is notorious for its tight security and has let little slip about Titan or any of its other projects. Earlier this year, Blizzard confirmed that development on Titan was proceeding and that the company had shuffled around some of its staff to share between World of Warcraft and the upcoming "casual" MMO. The name "Blackstone" is also somewhat similar to Blackthorne, an early Blizzard game from 1994. While the website for Project Blackstone is currently defunct, rest assured we'll be keeping our eye on it to see what happens when or if Blizzard turns on the lights.
