Oracle could raise PeopleSoft price

Daily Newsletters

Sign up to ZDNet UK's daily newsletter.

NEWS
Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison on Tuesday left the door open to raising the share price offer in its hostile takeover bid for competitor PeopleSoft. Speaking at Oracle's AppsWorld customer conference in London, Ellison reiterated the company's intention to continue support for PeopleSoft customers and to make it "price neutral" for them to switch to Oracle's own line of business applications. Ellison said that Oracle's $6.3bn (£3.79bn) cash tender to acquire PeopleSoft is "fully valued and very fair." PeopleSoft's board has consistently said Oracle's bid is too low. Asked whether Oracle would top its current offer, Ellison said, "Never say never." The chief executive also disputed notions that his company is trying to acquire PeopleSoft to overcome weakness in its applications business. Analysts and people familiar with Oracle have said that the company needs to bolster its applications business in order to offset any slowdown in its core database software business. Oracle earlier this month launched its hostile takeover bid to acquire PeopleSoft for $5.1bn shortly after PeopleSoft and business applications specialist J.D. Edwards announced their intent to merge. A combination of PeopleSoft and J.D. Edwards would displace Oracle as the No. 2 business software maker. Ellison said that his offer will make Oracle a more profitable and competitive company. Oracle initially offered $16 per share for PeopleSoft. Last week, it raised the bid to $19.50 per share, or $6.3bn. PeopleSoft's board has rejected both offers. Answering questions after his keynote speech at AppsWorld, Ellison said that the reasoning behind the company's bid for PeopleSoft has not been fully appreciated by industry analysts and the media. Ellison rejected the idea that Oracle is on guard against slowing sales in its traditionally strong database business. Recent surveys, however, have shown that the company is losing share to IBM and is facing a tougher fight in the low end of the database market, where Microsoft and open-source alternatives are growing in popularity. Oracle currently has the No. 2 position in the business applications business with an expected $2.6bn in revenue for 2003, behind SAP, which is expected to have $7.4bn in sales this year, according to AMR Research. "We think the database business and the applications business are very closely related and that has not been widely recognised," said Ellison. During his keynote discussion, Ellison said that Oracle's technical strategy of consolidating data in fewer databases, rather than scattering data in several places, makes finding business information in its e-business suite easier than in competing products. Ellison said that if Oracle succeeds in taking over PeopleSoft, Oracle will no longer "actively market" PeopleSoft products or take out advertising for PeopleSoft products. But in an attempt to sell the company's takeover offer to wary PeopleSoft customers, he pledged to support PeopleSoft products "for many years to come" and to give customers the option of moving to comparable products from Oracle. Ellison said the company has a "reasonable chance" to overtake SAP for the top spot in the applications business and said he expects Microsoft to continue to aggressively expand its presence in business applications. Even if Oracle succeeds in acquiring PeopleSoft, the company will still trail SAP by a wide margin, according to market share figures from AMR Research. Separately on Tuesday, Oracle said it has dropped its objections to PeopleSoft making changes to its offer for J.D. Edwards. PeopleSoft's board had cited that objection as an obstacle to the two companies holding talks over Oracle's offer. "We hope that with this waiver, PeopleSoft will finally agree to meet with us, as their shareholders are demanding," Jim Finn, an Oracle spokesperson, said in a statement issued on Tuesday morning.
For a round-up of the latest tech business coverage, see the Business News Section. Let the editors know what you think in the Mailroom.

Post your comment

In order to post a comment you need to be registered and logged in.

You can also log in with Facebook. Log in or create your ZDNet UK account below

  • Login

Will not be displayed with your comment

By signing up for this service, you indicate that you agree to our Terms and Conditions and have read and understood our Privacy Policy. Questions about membership? Find the answers in the Community FAQ

Get ZDNet UK's daily newsletter

Enter your email address to sign up

ZDNet UK Live

UnderINK

I agree with the previous commenter wholeheartedly. I couldn't say it better myself. This is very 'Big Brother'. And while I agree with protecting...

2 hours ago by UnderINK on European e-identity plan to be unveiled this month
Simon Bisson and Mary Branscombe

Nice to see that Turing's idea of a general purpose computer doing once-hardware-powered tasks in software is now universal ;-) Mary

7 hours ago by Simon Bisson and Mary Branscombe on Software with everything
Jason Burchell

seriously now. I've only bothered to read a small bit of the comments. do me and the rest of the world a favour. stop saying it does not work or...

11 hours ago by Jason Burchell via Facebook on Music industry negotiating over 24-bit downloads
Philip Charles Cohen

Read about it and weep, John Donahoe ... In addition to Visa’s V.me, there is now MasterCard’s PayPass digital wallet soon to arrive; another...

15 hours ago by Philip Charles Cohen via Facebook on PayPal takes phone-based payments to the high street
apexwm

Leslie Satenstein : Where have you ever seen Mozilla even mention this? Firefox is the most popular browser in the GNU/Linux OS, so I don't see...

16 hours ago by apexwm on Firefox rapid release improves Fedora Linux
songmaster

SHleG: Do you remember building a clockwork scorpion kit (I'm pretty sure I have a photo of it somewhere) — I think it was called something like...

18 hours ago by songmaster on Software with everything
Chris Wortman

Good I love Yahoo! Their search engine is getting better than Google as of late. I find more of what I want on the first page, and usually within...

18 hours ago by Chris Wortman via Facebook on Linux Mint 13 ramps up for KDE release
PatrickG

openhgs has made the point for Windows 8 multiple monitors without realising it! With Windows 7 you have to switch the mouse and so your focus...

20 hours ago by PatrickG on Windows 8 could speed multi-monitor uptake
Leslie Satenstein

Mozilla has threatened to stop supporting Linux. I guess that UBUNTU is going with another browser. I indicated that if Mozilla stops supporting...

21 hours ago by Leslie Satenstein via Facebook on Firefox rapid release improves Fedora Linux
Andy Bolstridge

Much as I abhor Microsoft's licensing practices, this is almost certainly down to purchasing IT equipment via 3rd party consultants - you get the...

22 hours ago by Andy Bolstridge via Facebook on 6 million wasted licences and £1,200 PCs: welcome to government IT
Jack Schofield

@openhgs Windows users have had multiple desktops since Linus started writing Linux. They just haven't shipped as standard because not enough...

2 days ago by Jack Schofield on Windows 8 could speed multi-monitor uptake
Jack Schofield

@Phil at Cloud4 What, Microsoft gets £1,200 per PC and £1,622 per server? Gosh, I'm amazed....

2 days ago by Jack Schofield on 6 million wasted licences and £1,200 PCs: welcome to government IT
craigsc

You guys have no idea what is going on at Autonomy. Autonomy could have been a much more profitable organization. The sales operations at Autonomy...

2 days ago by craigsc on HP cuts 27,000 staff as Autonomy chief Lynch leaves
Moley

How does this impact on dual or multi booting? Seems to me to more or less prohibit this, from Windows 8 anyway. Will Grub 2 recognise Windows 8,...

2 days ago by Moley on Windows 8 start-up speed forces USB boot workaround
apexwm

I don't understand why there cannot be a slight pause during the boot process so the user can press a key. Many operating systems do this, even if...

2 days ago by apexwm on Windows 8 start-up speed forces USB boot workaround
Gavin Goodman

You can now buy the Xi3 modular computer in the UK at http://www.ocdistribution.com . This can be bought with the Tand3m software, pricing and...

2 days ago by Gavin Goodman on CES 2012: Xi3 microSERV3R
Phil at Cloud4

I agree: Mike Lynch can clearly build a business and manage strategy. I suspect the exit of Mike is more likely the end of a planned handover...

2 days ago by Phil at Cloud4 on HP cuts 27,000 staff as Autonomy chief Lynch leaves
Phil at Cloud4

This is unbeleivable government wastage with only one winner... Microsoft 1 - Tax payer Nil!

2 days ago by Phil at Cloud4 on 6 million wasted licences and £1,200 PCs: welcome to government IT
Mispam

So what do you do when you can't boot into windows? Why can't I just hold Shift while I power up instead of having to boot into windows and click a...

2 days ago by Mispam on Windows 8 start-up speed forces USB boot workaround
apexwm

I've also seen that Mac OS X for Intel machines is supposed to run in VirtualBox, which would also be a nice solution. I've never tried it though.

2 days ago by apexwm on xTreme Triple Booting: Linux, Mac & Windows