Dell Said to Be Near Acquiring Quest to Add Data-Center Software

The purchase would cap a months-long bidding war for Questand fits with Dell's aim to add research that helps customersoutfit data centers for handling storage and cloud computing.Quest's software lets companies administer databases andservers, as then as back up information and recover lost data.

Dell told analysts at a June 13 meeting that it plans touse deals to boost revenue from data-center hardware, softwareand services by 45 percent to $27.5 billion by fiscal 2016,reducing the company's reliance on the slow-growing desktop andnotebook computer businesses.