Legendary computer network hardware maker 3Com is allegedly o announce a sale of itself to Bain Capital and Huawei Technologies for more than $2 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal. Apparently, Chinese sources will provide funding for the transaction. Under the terms of the deal, Chinese networking giant Huawei Technologies will get a minority stake in 3Com.

Huawei and 3Com have previously collaborated, as it has a non-compete agreement with 3Com's H3C (Huawei-3Com), a Chinese networking operation.

Huawei Technologies, founded in 1988, is China's largest communications equipment maker and specializes in research and development, production and marketing of communications equipments, and providing customized network solutions for telecom carriers. Apart from its China operations, Huawei also has R&D centers in Stockholm, Sweden; Dallas and Silicon Valley, U.S.; Bangalore, India; and Moscow, Russia. Telecom giant Vodafone awarded Huawei the 2007 Global Supplier Award for Outstanding Performance earlier this year. The company had revenue of around $8.5 billion in 2006.

3Com was founded in 1979 and started off by making Ethernet adaptor cards for many early 1980s computer systems, including the LSI-11, IBM PC, and VAX-11. In 2003, Huawei Technologies entered into a joint venture named Huawei-3Com with 3Com for Internet Protocol-based routers and switches, eventually selling its 49 percent stake to 3Com in 2007 for $882 million. Thus, Huawei has agreed to a non-compete clause for 18 months following the sale of its stake in Huawei-3Com. The company had revenue of less than $800 million in 2006.

It's also quite interesting to note that Bain, the well-known Boston-based private-equity firm, had bid against 3Com for H3C along with other buyout firms last year.

Shares of 3Com traded at less than $4 a share yesterday, rising upon the news in premarket trading to almost $5, while the buyout will see them evaluated at more than $5 a share. Their high was at $78.25 in Dec. 1996.

So far, none of the parties involved wanted to comment the WSJ report officially.