MIDDAY MARKETS: Intel, Qualcomm lead rally

Dealmaking inspired buying at midday Tuesday; tech bellwethers Intel and Qualcomm led the Nasdaq's gains. The Nasdaq climbed 65.88 to 3,792.40, while the Dow Jones industrial average shed 25.15 to 10,783.37.

The Inter@ctive Week @Net Index rose 8 to 514.37.

Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW), down 1.31 to 113.94, has agreed to shell out $2 billion to acquire Cobalt Networks Inc. (Nasdaq: COBT), up 14.25 to 55.38.

Inktomi (Nasdaq: INKT), up 1.44 to 121.81, Portal Software (Nasdaq: PRSF), up 3.75 to 43.63, Redback Networks (Nasdaq: RBAK), up 4.06 to 143.13, and Sun Microsystems teamed up to create an integrated broadband service delivery framework.

Qualcomm (Nasdaq: QCOM) blasted up 7 percent, or 4.88 to 74.69, and Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) gained 5 percent, or 3.19 to 69. Among other leading tech issues, Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) rose 0.94 to 61, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) was up 1.69 to 64.69, and Oracle (Nasdaq: ORCL) climbed 2.97 to 79.44.

EMI Group Plc and Time Warner Inc (NYSE: TWX), down 0.81 to 80.44, have made a number of concessions, including selling some record labels, in a last-minute bid to win European Commission approval for their joint venture, an industry source said on Tuesday.

Corel Corp. (Nasdaq: CORL), up 0.03 to 3.72, has managed to secure financing, the company said Tuesday, signing a deal with an unnamed institutional investor.

Barnesandnoble.com (Nasdaq: BNBN), up got a big boost from its deal with Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO) as investors sent shares up 1.44 to 6, or 31 percent. Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) fell 2.4 to 40.38, AOL (NYSE: AOL) fell 0.19 to 55.44 and Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) dropped 1.5 to 106.56.

Texas Instruments Inc. (NYSE: TXN), up 2.25 to 61.44, said it sees third quarter revenues accelerating as its semiconductor business remains strong. The company also said it is increasing its focus on Internet communications by diverting some analog design engineers into the telecommunications and networking departments. Motorola (NYSE: MOT) gained 0.88 to 33.88.

NetScout Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: NTCT) was up 3.81 to 20.25, or 23 percent after an upgrade praised its prospects with the release of its new nGenious product.