IBM is buying cloud computing company SoftLayer Technologies Inc. to expand its online software business.

Financial terms were not disclosed. The New York Times, citing an unidentified person told of the negotiations, put the deal's value at $2 billion. An IBM representative could not be immediately reached for comment.

SoftLayer is a privately held company based in Dallas with 13 data centers in the U.S., Asia and Europe.

Software stored and accessed on the Internet is increasingly popular with businesses because it lets workers in from any Internet-connected device. IBM Corp., based in Armonk, N.Y., anticipates hitting $7 billion annually in cloud revenue by the end of 2015.

The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter.