Three brief items

1. Selectica

Last time we checked in on the Delaware courts, Selectica had doubled the number of shares of common stock held by all of its shareholders except those of its would-be acquirers, Versata and Trilogy. It had also filed a complaint in court looking for a declaratory judgment -- it wants the court to give a goodhousekeeping seal to its actions.

More recently, (January 16) the defendants, Versata and Trilogy, filed their answer, with a copy to the SEC. You can read it for yourself here, I expect I'll discuss it next week.

2. Berndt out at Telular

Telular, a wireless communications company, has settled a pending proxy contest with Simcoe Partners, which owns just over 5% of its stock.

Simcoe's founder, Jeffrey Jacobowitz, will take a seat on Telular's board of directors, and the chairman of that board, John Berndt, will not stand for re-election. A new chairman will be chosen at the first board meeting after the 2009 annual meeting, which will likely take place in March. The announcement is a buit vague about timing. It mentions a 2010 annual meeting in March of that year, and it mentions a 2009 anual meeting upcoming -- so I'm guessing March for the more proximate meeting as well.

3. Circuit City, the electronics chaim that filed for bankruptcy in November, now says it is in talks with two potential buyers in connection with re-organization.

Meanwhile, its stores are holding "liquidation sales" that look suspiciously like those of an operation not too keen on liquidating. Discounts are at 10%, no more. This would make sense if the new buyers actually want to inherit an ongoing enterprise.