Brocade: Acquirers Need Not Apply

SAN JOSE, Calif. (TheStreet -- Brocade(BRCD Quote) has denied that it was shopping around for a buyer after months of M&A chatter swirling around the firm.

The switchmaker, which released its fourth-quarter results late on Monday, quickly dispelled any acquisition rumors during a conference call before the market open.

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Brocade had been touted as a possible acquisition target for Hewlett-Packard(HPQ Quote) prior to the tech bellwether's shock acquisition of 3Com(COMS Quote).

"We don't like to comment on rumors -- we have never commented on rumors," said Mike Klayko, the Brocade CEO, in response to an analyst's emailed question.

The Brocade chief, however, said that he wanted to address a slew of recent "misinformation" in the shape of rumors that the company had been shopping itself around. "We were not -- we have a very bright future," he added. "We want to put that to bed right upfront."

Brocade took the unusual step of releasing its fourth-quarter results at 7 p.m. ET on Monday and following up with a conference call before market open on Tuesday. A company spokesman told TheStreet that the schedule allowed more opportunity for analyst questions.

As expected, Brocade's management team was grilled on the threat posed by long-standing partner H-P, which now has access to 3Com's Ethernet switch technology.

"We have had a large partnership with H-P in the storage area, we believe that that's going to continue," replied Marc Randall, Brocade's senior vice president of products. "On the IP side, we have competed with H-P [and] we see some areas that they will continue to be weak in -- one area is the data center."