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IBM’s announcement that it will buy Confluent for roughly $11 billion is the kind of headline that wakes up Main Street and Wall Street alike. The deal, struck at $31 a share, is being positioned as a strategic move to give IBM a leg up in the competitive race to monetize enterprise AI and real-time data.
Confluent’s stock surged nearly 30 percent on the news as investors priced in the $31-per-share cash offer, which represents a healthy premium to recent trading levels. IBM says it will fund the transaction with available cash and expects the purchase to be accretive to adjusted EBITDA in the first full year and to free cash flow in the second year, a pledge that ought to reassure shareholders who’ve grown tired of headline-grabbing deals that add little value.
What IBM is buying is the plumbing of modern enterprise data: Confluent’s real-time streaming platform—built on Apache Kafka—keeps data moving between apps, clouds and services so AI systems actually have clean, timely inputs to work with. That capability is precisely why Confluent counts thousands of customers, including a large swath of the Fortune 500, and why IBM’s pitch that this is a “smart data platform for enterprise AI” rings true on paper.
Conservative readers should applaud American companies that still build real infrastructure while also staying skeptical of endless consolidation. IBM has been on an acquisition streak—following big bets like Red Hat and HashiCorp—so this is less a one-off and more a pattern of empire-building that deserves scrutiny about strategic fit and managerial discipline. The track record of integration should be tested, not assumed.
Make no mistake: there will be regulatory eyes on this transaction and Confluent shareholders must still approve the deal, even as major holders have agreed to vote in favor, smoothing one hurdle. Americans who care about competition and data sovereignty should demand transparency in the approval process and insist regulators don’t rubber-stamp another megadeal without serious review.
There’s also a national-interest angle here: keeping critical data infrastructure in responsible American hands matters in a world where AI is rapidly becoming a strategic asset. IBM’s public pitch highlights partnerships across cloud providers and AI firms, which underscores why policymakers should insist on safeguards that protect customers, taxpayers and national security, not just corporate market share.
At bottom, hardworking Americans want innovation that creates jobs and strengthens our economy, not deal churn that enriches financiers and leaves customers holding the bag. This acquisition could deliver genuine value if IBM executes, but conservatives should remain vigilant: cheer the innovation, demand accountability, and make sure this kind of concentrated power serves ordinary citizens rather than corporate insiders.
