SiliconBeat

Lloyd Miller, a current and former investor in several Silicon Valley companies, disclosed Tuesday being the owner of a 5.9 percent stake in yet another: Ditech Communications of Mountain View.

According to a filing with the SEC, Miller will use his recent purchases of Ditech stock to support Read the rest of this entry »

Trident Microsystems said it has finally received notice from Spencer Capital Opportunity Fund of identity of the two nominees Spencer has said it wants to nominate to the chip maker’s board of directors. The names of the dissident nominees were not released.

The New York based investment company had put Trident on notice of its intention to nominate its own candidates earlier this year when Read the rest of this entry »

IPass, the Redwood City developer of business-mobility software whose board has spent much of the last two years struggling with large and disgruntled investors, has agreed to “take steps to return to shareholders” up to $40 million, according to a deal it has reached with Foxhill Master Fund. Foxhill, which owns about 7 percent of iPass’s outstanding shares, had launched a proxy battle to declassify the iPass board, forcing all directors to stand for re-election each year rather than serving in various overlapping terms. It also nominated three people of its own choosing to serve on the iPass board.

One of the three, Kenneth Traub, has been Read the rest of this entry »

Micrel, the San Jose chip maker that won a nasty proxy battle last year with its then-largest independent shareholder, Obrem Capital, decided it better extend its poison-pill defense against hostile takeovers by one more year. The shareholder rights plan  set up a year ago was to have expired today, but will now live on until March 24, 2010, according to a regulatory filing.

On March 19, Micrel entered into a Read the rest of this entry »

IPass, the Redwood City developer of business-mobility software that has been struggling with disgruntled investors for more than a year, now has a proxy battle on its hands with a proposal  to declassify the iPass board being made by by its third largest shareholder, Foxhill Master Fund, which wants each director to stand for election every year, rather than serving staggered three-year terms.

Foxhill is also putting forward at least three Read the rest of this entry »

For a third time, Actel has extended the deadline for nominees to its board of directors at the request of Ramius, a relatively new major shareholder with a lot of ideas about how Actel should go about increasing stockholder value.

Nominations must now be submitted by the close of business Read the rest of this entry »

Micrel, the San Jose chip maker who last year successfully fought off a proxy battle with Obrem Capital, its largest independent stockholder, spent $10 million this week to buy back 1.6 million of Obrem’s 10.7 million shares.

The company paid Obrem Read the rest of this entry »

Transmeta, the Santa Clara developer of semiconductor technology, said Wednesday afternoon that it “will now explore a possible sale” of the company. The move no doubt pleased its newest board member and largest shareholder, Bryant Riley, who gave up his proxy battle with the company in return for a board seat for himself and two others he agreed on with the company. Riley, who owns 12.1 percent of Transmeta’s shares, also agreed to limit any future accumulation of them to no more than 13 percent. Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s filings in the Yahoo saga include a hit piece on Carl Icahn’s prowess as an investor. It kicks off with the prominently featured graphic we show here, and then details information related to his involvement with 15 companies over the last couple of years, including what has happened to the stock price of each since Icahn began his involvement. In case you’re wondering, in the case of all but three, the stocks lost value, which Yahoo kindly helps you tally with the use of big bold arrows.

We can’t vouch for the accuracy of any of this Read the rest of this entry »