Cisco Spurring Wave of Data Center M&A?

Cisco Systems Inc.’s (CSCO) foray last week into the data center world now has analysts and pundits talking M&A.

In their minds, Cisco has sparked a new wave of consolidation among rivals that will want to compete solidly with the networking giant. IBM should buy Juniper Networks, writes a UBS analyst in a client memo, while HP should snap up Brocade Communications.

But, the analyst added, Cisco likely will outpace them all now that it has launched server computers for data centers.