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Oracle Hires Mark Hurd As Co-President

77 points by gamble 16y ago

Another1 16y ago
when Oracle bought Sun many analysts speculated that Oracle will sell Sun Hardware Division, of course even more analysts speculated the obvious which is, Oracle is taking a dive into the hardware business When I read this all i was thinking was, Mark Hurd seems like a hardware guy, Oracle really wants to get this hardware business right!
- kiujygtyujik 16y ago
  Hurd is the guy who managed to single handedly destroy the remains of HP's engineering ability. I give it about a week before the last Sun guy leaves. Of course this could be a cunning plan to avoid the costs of redundancy payments - hire Hurd and watch all your best engineers resign for free.
  - brown9-2 16y ago
    Hurd is the guy who managed to single handedly destroy the remains of HP's engineering ability I thought Carly Fiorina was blamed for this? How many people can single-handedly destroy something? Let's be realistic, CEO's aren't able to get much done without the approval of the board of directors, who are elected by the company's shareholders. There are very few "single-handedly"s in business. You can't blame just the CEO, as there are people above him/her. Blame the board, blame the shareholders who didn't/don't value "HP's engineering ability".
    - kiujygtyujik 16y ago
      Fiorina destroyed HP as a great engineering company turning it into a printer ink marketing scam. Hurd managed to get almost every remaining engineer to leave - see the stories posted here at the time.
seldo 16y ago
At HP, Hurd was famous for ruthlessly cutting jobs. If I were a former Sun employee, I would be very scared of this guy.
- gamble 16y ago
  Hurd's only real achievement at HP was finishing Fiorina's work and applying the coup de grace to the HP Way. HPers loathe him. They'd have been dancing in the street when he left, if they didn't know that the board was so happy with his performance that his successor was guaranteed to carry on in the same style. Of course, if there are Oracle employees who have a problem working for people with Hurd's attitude, they haven't been paying attention.
  - kujawa 16y ago
    I worked for Snapfish (division of HP) for about six months last year. It was quite disappointing. This isn't a company that's ever going to innovate again. I grew up loving HP calculators, and detest anything that doesn't run on RPN. I have an HP-15c app on my iPhone (notibly, not the one done by HP, which is inferior.) Carly and then Turd killed any sort of innovation in this company. They're purest evil, and I can see why Oracle would like to hire this sort of executive.
    - tonystubblebine 16y ago
      Why are they evil? Maybe they're just business people. This is an honest question. You're not the only person I've heard react that way. Merely cutting R&D just doesn't seem inherently evil to me, even if it turns out to be the wrong decision.
      - pyre 16y ago
        I think he means 'evil' in a 'you just ruined something that I thought was great' sense.
        16y ago
flatulent1 16y ago
It is a bit funny seeing one Oracle exec who had an affair (Charles E. Phillips Jr) getting replaced by another. Someone could base a movie on them. It's good to see Mr Hurd back at work so soon. He seems a good match and well qualified. Besides seeing how Oracle does under him, it'll be interesting to see what influence he has on decisions affecting the industry in general. In particular, some wonder how much Android will be affected by the JAVA case against Google. Others wonder about the future of other open-source projects such as VirtualBox (development appears to be continuing) If they need another exec with a colorful past, there's always former Broadcom CEO Henry Nicholas. He was accused of putting drugs in others' drinks; an airline pilot complained of pot smoke so thick that a gas mask was needed. http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/06/06/henry_nicholas/ http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/06/06/he... Steve Jobs used LSD when he was younger and turned out pretty well. Sun had other that did the same. I heard one former Sun exec in a PBS interview talking about that experimental period, trying to expand the mind. Basically he said drugs failed at that, and the expanding experience came later... the internet There's a little bit of related history at this link that mentions Suns' fifth employee: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-grim/read-the-never-before-pub_b_227887.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-grim/read-the-never-befor...
- brisance 16y ago
  I know this is the internet and all, but it would be prudent not to cast aspersions about executives having an "affair" when the fact was that Hurd left for other reasons.
  - joe_the_user 16y ago
    Uh, Hurd left because of unethical behavior which many would interpret as evidence he was having an affair. HP didn't have overwhelming evidence of an affair (and an act isn't necessarily grounds for termination) but the world already a preponderance of evidence. I don't think Mark Hurd is going to be starting any civil cases on the subject any time soon.
    - 16y ago
some1else 16y ago
So.. If under his watch HP made a lot of money with service parts, and substantially reduced R&D spending, he may be a great fit for Oracle. In the sense that they will spend as little as they can on improving Solaris, and just try to make it necessary for the enterprises to integrate with the rest of Oracle portfolio? :-) If I recall correctly, that's the market potential that the recent memo was referring to.
- ojbyrne 16y ago
  Those kinds of things only work once. I think every IT manager out there knows Solaris is dead, and will be pushing to migrate to open-source alternatives. And every other product that Sun brought to Oracle is also suspect. I just recently quit working at an IT managerish job, and I hope the one thing I left them with is "never, ever buy an HP printer."
jonursenbach 16y ago
Since Oracle is a direct competitor to HP, I wonder if HP (or even the SEC) are going to be investigating the hire for conflicts of interest regarding trade secrets just like they went crazy when engineers left Google for Apple.
SkyMarshal 16y ago
"H.P. found no evidence of sexual harassment, but said Mr. Hurd had tried to conceal a personal relationship with Ms. Fisher by removing her name from his expenses for meals. " Interesting. He's a multimillionaire CEO and couldn't be bothered to just pay for the dinners out of his own pocket, but expensed them to the corporate card instead? It must be good to be da king. Until you're not...
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- wmf 16y ago
  That's normal behavior for HP executives. The company also paid for them to make personal trips in HP's jets.
  - amirmc 16y ago
    I've heard there are sometimes insurance reasons for that. i.e the senior execs can only fly on private flights.
    - mhansen 16y ago
      Can you explain the reasons?
      - stingraycharles 16y ago
        After some quick googling, I found more references to this claim, but only in comments on articles: http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/37608 http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/37608: "The use of a corporate jet is often required by corporate policy intended to protect the executive from the threat of violence or abduction. " http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/11/auto_officials_nailed_on_priva.html http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/11/auto...: "Most corporate CEOs in companies with corporate jets are REQUIRED to use those jets as their ONLY mode of travel, as per the insurance requirements of being the Chief Executive Office and Chairman of a Publicly Traded Company.".
Mrdev4 16y ago
I doubt Phillips will have a problem finding another job.
treblig 16y ago
When was the last time a "Co-President" worked well? Serious question, I'm just having trouble thinking of one.
- wmf 16y ago
  Oracle has been running with two presidents for a while now, so presumably it's working. Larry and Sergey are co-presidents of Google.

77 points by gamble 16y ago

when Oracle bought Sun many analysts speculated that Oracle will sell Sun Hardware Division, of course even more analysts speculated the obvious which is, Oracle is taking a dive into the hardware business When I read this all i was thinking was, Mark Hurd seems like a hardware guy, Oracle really wants to get this hardware business right!

kiujygtyujik 16y ago
Hurd is the guy who managed to single handedly destroy the remains of HP's engineering ability. I give it about a week before the last Sun guy leaves. Of course this could be a cunning plan to avoid the costs of redundancy payments - hire Hurd and watch all your best engineers resign for free.
- brown9-2 16y ago
  Hurd is the guy who managed to single handedly destroy the remains of HP's engineering ability I thought Carly Fiorina was blamed for this? How many people can single-handedly destroy something? Let's be realistic, CEO's aren't able to get much done without the approval of the board of directors, who are elected by the company's shareholders. There are very few "single-handedly"s in business. You can't blame just the CEO, as there are people above him/her. Blame the board, blame the shareholders who didn't/don't value "HP's engineering ability".
  - kiujygtyujik 16y ago
    Fiorina destroyed HP as a great engineering company turning it into a printer ink marketing scam. Hurd managed to get almost every remaining engineer to leave - see the stories posted here at the time.

seldo 16y ago

At HP, Hurd was famous for ruthlessly cutting jobs. If I were a former Sun employee, I would be very scared of this guy.

gamble 16y ago
Hurd's only real achievement at HP was finishing Fiorina's work and applying the coup de grace to the HP Way. HPers loathe him. They'd have been dancing in the street when he left, if they didn't know that the board was so happy with his performance that his successor was guaranteed to carry on in the same style. Of course, if there are Oracle employees who have a problem working for people with Hurd's attitude, they haven't been paying attention.
- kujawa 16y ago
  I worked for Snapfish (division of HP) for about six months last year. It was quite disappointing. This isn't a company that's ever going to innovate again. I grew up loving HP calculators, and detest anything that doesn't run on RPN. I have an HP-15c app on my iPhone (notibly, not the one done by HP, which is inferior.) Carly and then Turd killed any sort of innovation in this company. They're purest evil, and I can see why Oracle would like to hire this sort of executive.
  - tonystubblebine 16y ago
    Why are they evil? Maybe they're just business people. This is an honest question. You're not the only person I've heard react that way. Merely cutting R&D just doesn't seem inherently evil to me, even if it turns out to be the wrong decision.
    - pyre 16y ago
      I think he means 'evil' in a 'you just ruined something that I thought was great' sense.
      - 16y ago

flatulent1 16y ago

It is a bit funny seeing one Oracle exec who had an affair (Charles E. Phillips Jr) getting replaced by another. Someone could base a movie on them. It's good to see Mr Hurd back at work so soon. He seems a good match and well qualified. Besides seeing how Oracle does under him, it'll be interesting to see what influence he has on decisions affecting the industry in general. In particular, some wonder how much Android will be affected by the JAVA case against Google. Others wonder about the future of other open-source projects such as VirtualBox (development appears to be continuing) If they need another exec with a colorful past, there's always former Broadcom CEO Henry Nicholas. He was accused of putting drugs in others' drinks; an airline pilot complained of pot smoke so thick that a gas mask was needed. http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/06/06/henry_nicholas/ http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/06/06/he... Steve Jobs used LSD when he was younger and turned out pretty well. Sun had other that did the same. I heard one former Sun exec in a PBS interview talking about that experimental period, trying to expand the mind. Basically he said drugs failed at that, and the expanding experience came later... the internet There's a little bit of related history at this link that mentions Suns' fifth employee: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-grim/read-the-never-before-pub_b_227887.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-grim/read-the-never-befor...

brisance 16y ago
I know this is the internet and all, but it would be prudent not to cast aspersions about executives having an "affair" when the fact was that Hurd left for other reasons.
- joe_the_user 16y ago
  Uh, Hurd left because of unethical behavior which many would interpret as evidence he was having an affair. HP didn't have overwhelming evidence of an affair (and an act isn't necessarily grounds for termination) but the world already a preponderance of evidence. I don't think Mark Hurd is going to be starting any civil cases on the subject any time soon.
  - 16y ago

some1else 16y ago

So.. If under his watch HP made a lot of money with service parts, and substantially reduced R&D spending, he may be a great fit for Oracle. In the sense that they will spend as little as they can on improving Solaris, and just try to make it necessary for the enterprises to integrate with the rest of Oracle portfolio? :-) If I recall correctly, that's the market potential that the recent memo was referring to.

ojbyrne 16y ago
Those kinds of things only work once. I think every IT manager out there knows Solaris is dead, and will be pushing to migrate to open-source alternatives. And every other product that Sun brought to Oracle is also suspect. I just recently quit working at an IT managerish job, and I hope the one thing I left them with is "never, ever buy an HP printer."

jonursenbach 16y ago

Since Oracle is a direct competitor to HP, I wonder if HP (or even the SEC) are going to be investigating the hire for conflicts of interest regarding trade secrets just like they went crazy when engineers left Google for Apple.

SkyMarshal 16y ago

"H.P. found no evidence of sexual harassment, but said Mr. Hurd had tried to conceal a personal relationship with Ms. Fisher by removing her name from his expenses for meals. " Interesting. He's a multimillionaire CEO and couldn't be bothered to just pay for the dinners out of his own pocket, but expensed them to the corporate card instead? It must be good to be da king. Until you're not...

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
wmf 16y ago
That's normal behavior for HP executives. The company also paid for them to make personal trips in HP's jets.
- amirmc 16y ago
  I've heard there are sometimes insurance reasons for that. i.e the senior execs can only fly on private flights.
  - mhansen 16y ago
    Can you explain the reasons?
    - stingraycharles 16y ago
      After some quick googling, I found more references to this claim, but only in comments on articles: http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/37608 http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/37608: "The use of a corporate jet is often required by corporate policy intended to protect the executive from the threat of violence or abduction. " http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/11/auto_officials_nailed_on_priva.html http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/11/auto...: "Most corporate CEOs in companies with corporate jets are REQUIRED to use those jets as their ONLY mode of travel, as per the insurance requirements of being the Chief Executive Office and Chairman of a Publicly Traded Company.".

Mrdev4 16y ago

I doubt Phillips will have a problem finding another job.

treblig 16y ago

When was the last time a "Co-President" worked well? Serious question, I'm just having trouble thinking of one.

wmf 16y ago
Oracle has been running with two presidents for a while now, so presumably it's working. Larry and Sergey are co-presidents of Google.