What is driving this was an activist investor who wanted EMC to divest its investment in VMware. It seems part two of this is sell off EMC's storage business to an acquirer.
I think if a server vendor owned VMware, it would not be good for the broader market. An independent VMware is more valuable to its stockholders.
So this likely was really about EMC's storage business, post VMware divestment.
That said, while there is overlap, it really is only the overlap between 3PAR and VNX. The rest of EMC's storage portfolio would find no real overlap, especially given HP's support of its HDS OEM relationship is lukewarm.
If HP purchased EMC, it could drive an acquisition of NetApp, most likely by Cisco.
If Cisco purchased EMC's storage business, it may drive an acquisition of NetApp, but is less likely.