T-Mobile, BlackBerry Among Tech Companies Just Sitting on the Auction Block

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- This year is shaping up to be among the biggest ever for mergers and acquisitions, according to Dealogic. Global M&A volume was $2.28 trillion in the first half of 2015, the second highest on record.

Still, not every company that tries to sell finds a buyer. In fact, a lot of companies fail to sell, said a technology banker. The reality is some assets are difficult to sell, and when companies ultimately don't find buyers, management isn't surprised, the banker said.

A second banker said it's hard for large, public companies to sell, because the pool of buyers shrinks with price and number of products.

Sellers may want more than buyers are willing to pay. Companies deteriorate too quickly for some buyers to consider. Governments sometimes won't let deals transact.

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Here are a half-dozen technology companies that have sat on the auction block for years:

T-Mobile USA (TMUS - Get Report) -- T-Mobile has had plenty of interested buyers, but the U.S. wants it to stay the fourth-largest phone company in the country.

It's attractive to wireless carriers who want to gain scale or remove a competitor and to TV companies who want to compete with wireless carriers, said Colby Synesael, an analyst at Cowen.

It's had numerous offers. In March 2011, AT&T (T) announced plans to buy T-Mobile for $39 billion. Nine months later, AT&T decided to pay a $7 billion breakup fee rather than fight U.S. antitrust regulators. A few years later, Softbank (SFTBY) attempted to persuade regulators to let its portfolio company Sprint (S) buy T-Mobile but also gave up. The latest rumor is that Dish (DISH) wants to acquire T-Mobile.