American Software Inc. (Nasdaq: AMSWA), business software maker, on Wednesday reported that its net profit was up 16 percent in the first quarter as the company gained increased revenue from services and maintenance contracts.

American Software earned $1.4 million, or 5 cents per share, in the last quarter. In comparison to net income of $1.2 million, or 5 cents per share, during the same quarter last year. If the company didn’t have additional expenses covering employees stock compensation and acquisitions,The company mentioned it would have earned 6 cents per share.

Revenue increased 7 percent to $19 million.

Maintenance revenue for American Software  in the recent quarter was up 4 percent to $7.1 million and services revenue jumped 34 percent to $9.2 million.

shares of American Software gained 14 cents to close at $5.23.

CA Technologies (Nasdaq: CA) announced on Monday that it has agreed to acquire Arcot Systems Inc, maker of authentication and anti-fraud software, for $200 Million.

Dave Hansen, General Manager for the Security business at CA Technologies, said in a statement. “Arcot brings to CA Technologies a strong business in fraud prevention and unique capabilities in advanced authentication using a software-only approach,”  “This acquisition adds industry-leading technology that extends the breadth and depth of our strong IAM portfolio and gives our customers more first-class options for securing their Web-based business.”

Arcot Systems, which was founded in 1997,  helps prevent fraudulent transactions for about one million internet credit card transactions daily, the company provides its software through its own hosted servers.

Ram Varadarajan, President and CEO of Arcot ,said in a statement.”Identity is a critical area for security whether you’re talking about in-house or the cloud, and with 120 million identities verified by our solutions today, we bring a strong, solid recurring revenue base as well as sources of new growth opportunities for CA Technologies,”

Arcot’s operations and 165 employees will join CA Technologies.

Shares of CA Technologies were down 16 cents to $18.14.

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ)on Friday increased its offer for 3Par Inc. to $1.88 billion, once again outbidding Dell Inc.’s (Nasdaq: DELL) offer by 11 percent.

The new HP offer comes a few hours after 3Par accepted Dell’s matched $1.6 billion offer, HP fired back offering $1.8 billion for the company, or $27 per share in cash.
The bidding war for 3Par began last week when Dell offered to buy the company for $1.15 billion. HP had also made an earlier offer as well, but was rejected.

During early trading on Friday, Shares of 3Par increased $5.43, or 21 percent, to $31.46. Investors are expecting Dell to respond with another counter offer due to 3Par’s Shares being above HP’s current offer price.

Dell spokesman David Frink said that the company has plans to review HP’s new offer and “act in the best interests of our customers, shareholders and long-term value creation.”

Both companies are viewing the storage company 3Par as a way to build up their computing businesses, software, data storage and other services to customers. They are also both trying to expand beyond the PC business due to shrinking profits as many companies are not buying their own servers anymore.

Dell’s Shares were up 21 cents, or 1.8 percent, to 11.96 in morning trading. HP shares decreased 46 cents, or 1.2 percent, to $37.76.

Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) on Thursday raised its offer price for storage company 3PAR to $1.8 Billion, outbidding Dell’s (Nasdaq: DELL) revised offer made earlier in the day by approximately $200 Million.