M&A Avago (the LSI acquirers) just bought Emulex

Ok, this is starting to look like someone is buying up the tech behind storage and storage networking on the hardware side. Avago acquired LSI in 2013, and now they’ve done and grabbed Emulex. Emulex has a large FC capability, but I can’t imagine that this is the only reason for this buy. They also have converged network adapters, RDMA and offload capability, and other bits. They are an OEM to many large vendors. They also do ASICs, as does LSI. Their ASICs include storage, networking, and fabric controllers. Though their FC controllers peak at 8G. But it still complements the LSI bits which do 12g/6g SAS. I had thought Emulex might be looking to sell at some point, but wasn’t sure who would grab them. This one seems to be making sense, and I get a picture of a larger Avago strategy emerging. If I were a betting man (founding a startup? nah, not a betting man …) I’d say they would be in the market fairly soon for a 40GbE player. Who is left in that camp: Chelsio, Solarflare, Mellanox, and now Intel. I’ve got an guess (won’t share it though, want to see if I am right).