3Com says no new agreement on Bain deal

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Network equipment maker 3Com Corp (COMS.O) said on Wednesday that it had not yet reached a new merger agreement with its proposed buyers Bain Capital Partners and Huawei Technologies Co Ltd HWT.UL, triggering a 21 percent fall in its shares.

The company said, however, that it will proceed with a vote on the original deal in order to meet its merger commitments. The original terms had failed to win approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) and 3Com.

The vote will be held in a meeting on March 21, after being postponed from March 7.

Talks with Bain are continuing, it said, but the parties had not been able to agree on an alternative deal that would address CFIUS concerns and was acceptable to 3Com's board.

The company's shares slumped 61 cents to $2.25.

3Com said its board of directors continues to recommend that shareholders vote in favor of the deal, under which they would receive $5.30 cash per share. (Reporting by Sinead Carew and Ritsuko Ando, editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Dave Zimmerman)