The wheel of commerce sometimes turns softly.

• Author: Schwab, Robert
• Position: Sun Microsystems Inc. acquires Storage Technology Corp.

MERGERS AND ACQUSITIONS.

Colorado was treated to two big time M&A deals announced last month, one that will remove a storied name from the roster of Colorado-based companies, and a second that will add a new story to a local company that is growing in global stature.

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California-based Sun Microsystems Inc. is acquiring Storage Technology Corp., almost 36 years old and founded by four IBM engineers who wanted to strike out on their own and who, by founding Storage Tek, launched Colorado's home-grown high-tech industry.

Storage Tek had, in essence, become the grandfather of most other high-tech startups in the state, and even in its sale, opens a door for new economic development on land that has been its Louisville headquarters campus for more than 30 years.

Then there is ProLogis, the Aurora-based company that has become the world's largest real estate investment trust specializing in industrial warehousing and distribution space.

The company, spotted as a growing world landlord by ColoradoBiz in its June 2004 issue, said it will acquire a rival, San Francisco-based Catellus Development Corp., for cash, stock and debt totaling $4.9 billion.

That deal, news of which broke in The Wall Street Journal, is the kind and size that puts the Colorado business community back on the stage of world commerce.

Since Catellus is a high-dollar real estate investor whose national reputation and revenues were significantly larger than those of ProLogis, the acquisition launches the Colorado company on a path that could soon have it ranked in the Fortune 500.

Colorado posted 10 companies on that revenues-ranked list this year, up from eight in 2004. The annual state-by-state listing of companies in Fortune is always considered a measure of a region's reputation as a national center of commerce, so adding to the list becomes an important consideration for the Colorado business community.

The Catellus deal was preceded by another billion-dollar-plus acquisition for ProLogis last year, and an announcement in May that the company plans to develop one billion square feet of industrial distribution space in China. That global strategy is aided by Denver's location in the middle of the United States and the availability of Denver International Airport to facilitate business travel.

Big deals for...