It’s been eighteen days since the bidding war over 3Par began, and we’re wondering if there’s even an end in sight. 3Par released a statement this morning saying that HP raised its bid again, to $33 per share. That’s an increase from its previously announced offer of $30 per share.

This “Superior Proposal” aims to woo 3Par as far away from Dell’s initial acquisition offering as it can, with the terms of agreement allowing the server company to entertain other offers. That’s exactly what 3Par has been doing, stretching this bidding war out for nearly three weeks.

Back in August, John Furrier predicted 3PAR bidding would exceed $2 Billion, and predicted back in May that storage would be the next hot market to watch for mergers and acquisition.

Yesterday on TheCUBE, Wikibon.org’s Dave Vellante (SiliconANGLE contributor and lead analyst for Wikibon) predicted “The ping pong match is not over; someone is going to blink but I don’t think it’s going to be Dell today. I think they’ll match HP’s offer and my prediction is that HP will counter – this thing is going higher.”

Vellante commented on the matter:

“HP has an enormous legacy business in its aging EVA product line and it resells high end technology from Hitachi – 3PAR would fit HP perfectly. Dell on the other hand has a mandate to transform from a reseller of technology to an enterprise IT powerhouse. 3PAR fills a hole in the high end of its product line by giving it critical IP that allows Dell to lessen its reliance on EMC which accounts for about half of Dell’s storage business. I’ll say this – this deal makes IBM’s $340M acquisition of XIV look like a total bargain. ”

The bidding war only emphasizes HP’s and Dell’s need for an acquisition of this nature, as they seek to expand their own offerings. The demand swelling around 3Par will only increase interest for the next acquisition targets in the industry as well. In the meantime, 3Par faces a patent infringement lawsuit, along with six other data storage companies.

John also spoke directly yesterday on #theCube with Vellante and our News Desk Editor Kristen Nicole. On the show and only hours to go before the deadline, Vellante said that “…the ping pong match is not over; someone is going to blink but I don’t think it’s going to be Dell today. I think they’ll match HP’s offer and my prediction is that HP will counter – this thing is going higher.”

This will undoubtedly come up on #theCube’s live coverage from #VMworld’s final day today, so stay tuned for that and our ongoing coverage on the 3PAR bidding war.