Avaya Close To Acquisition Of Radvision: Report

The Israeli newspaper Globes on Tuesday reported that Avaya and Radvision are in "advanced talks" on a deal that, for $200 million, would represent a 30 percent premium on Radvision's market cap.

The report triggered a spike in Radvision shares Tuesday, peaking at a 16.9 percent gain. Globes noted that Radvision has been looking for a buyer for sometime, and that HP was in the mix a year ago in negotiations that ended over a disagreement about price.

An Avaya spokesperson said the company does not comment on "rumors or speculation."

The potential move isn't far-fetched. Avaya has of late been an active acquirer of companies with technologies adjacent to its expanding UC and contact center strategies, and Radvision has been playing defense since losing a lucrative OEM relationship with Cisco in 2010.

That agreement, at its peak, accounted for more than one third of Radvision's revenue but was pushed aside when Cisco closed its acquisition of Tandberg in 2010.

Radvision has since been looking to broaden its offerings. Among recent moves, the company acquired Aethra's HD video endpoint business in 2010, and earlier this year launched Scopia Mobile v3, an enterprise application for connecting video and telepresence systems to Apple iOS and Google Android devices.

The overall enterprise videoconferencing and telepresence market grew 24.3 percent year-over-year in the third quarter, according to researcher IDC, with overall revenues of $680.4 million. IDC noted that the video market has grown by 20 percent or higher for three of the past four quarters. Cisco now leads the space with a 51.6 market share.