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Speculation over EDS offer hike for Mphasis Gaurav Pai & Nishanth Vasudevan, Dec.28,2006  MphasiS has gained close to 7% in the last week, closing at Rs 288, down marginally from Tuesday’s close. Speculation is rife that in case EDS wants its open offer to be successful, it will have to increase the price significantly above the current market price.  EDS, the American IT giant that holds close to 61% in MphasiS, recently announced an open offer to acquire a further 20% stake in MphasiS. The offer was made at a price of Rs 204.50 per share and was open between November 27 and December 18.  However, analysts warn that trying to draw parallels from i-flex (the latter increased its open offer price from Rs 1,475 to Rs 2,100) may not be very prudent. They feel that i-flex is primarily a products company (with advantage of intellectual property rights revenues) which Oracle wants to badly consolidate its stake in, while MphasiS is like any other services company.  On the contrary, analysts say that EDS has learnt its lessons from i-flex and knows that hiking its offer price may still see the same dismal response. They feel that EDS may first want to consolidate its India operations with MphasiS, which should be complete by January, and only then may consider any further moves.