Would Microsoft be able to afford SAP? According to Google Finance, they have a market cap of $77.04bn and Microsoft would have to pay a hefty premium over this.
Good point. SAP is an order of magnitude bigger than Skype but the point about getting into this space if they're serious about getting into a different space is a good one. Netsuite, intuit & salesforce are trading @ $2.3b, $16.75b & $17.9b. They could conceivably buy all three with just this 'overseas cash' they supposedly need to spend and still have change. Thinking about MS's available cash in terms of companies they could buy really puts some perceptive on it - huge.
They could do nearly six Skype-sized deals, just using cash (without issuing bonds or using stock!) Incredible. They could probably buy SAP, but their cash pile would be gone, plus they would have to give up a significant amount of stock as well. Doubt Ballmer would be willing to risk this.
I've heard elsewhere that Apple is sitting on a ~$35bn cash pile. One wonders when the US Government will declare some sort of 'tax holiday' or window during which these companies can repatriate all this cash.
http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE:SAP
Also, what would the European Commission say about this? I don't think they would look favourably on this. They're not exactly fond of Microsoft.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Microsoft_compet...