IBM shares fell more than 2% in premarket trading.
The multinational technology corporation is hoping to receive more than £738million ($1billion) for the sale, the same amount asked for almost a year ago,Axios has reported.
Morgan Stanley led the process when they first explored a sale of the division in early 2021. At the time, WSJ reported that the unit was generating around $1billion in annual revenue but was unprofitable.
Sources claim the division continues to lose money, prompting renewed attempts to sell it in the opening days and weeks of 2022. IBM partnered with BofA Securities to find a buyer for Watson Health in late 2021.
One source states that bids were due in the last few days and IBM hope to select the winner by the close of January. A strategic buyer and several private equity firms are believed to be in the running.
This potential move by IBM follows Oracles £22.4billion acquisition of Cerner, an electronic health record (EHR) provider. Headquartered in Texas in the United States of America, Oracle defines itself as a “cloud technology company” and offers cloud application and platform services.
A report in the Financial Times said that a deal, in stark contrast to IBM, would help cement Oracle in the fast growing health IT sector as Cerner is one of the largest provider of hospital electronic medical systems to the US healthcare market and a leading supplier to the NHS.