According to the Wall Street Journal, International Business Machines and Sun Microsystems are in the final stages of negotiations to combine the two computer firms.

Quoting people familiar with the matter, WSJ said the companies are now discussing a deal in which IBM would pay $9.55 a share for Sun, about $1-a-share lower than Sun previously expected.

"The revised price - valuing the entire company at about $7 billion - would lower the amount IBM would have to pay by roughly $750 million," the daily said.

The report said Sun is demanding assurances in return that IBM would push to complete a deal even if it faces vigorous regulatory objections.

Another daily, the New York Times said the two companies have been negotiating for weeks, ironing out terms of an agreement that would turn IBM into a dominant supplier of high -profit Unix servers and related technology.

Citing people familiar with the negotiations, the NYT said a final agreement could be announced today, although it is more likely to be made public next week. They added that IBM's board had already approved the deal.