11 ms·

The story I heard (I worked at Borland briefly in 1999): Microsoft would send a limo to the Borland HQ to pick up engineers for interviews on their lunch breaks

The story I heard (I worked at Borland briefly in 1999): Microsoft would send a limo to the Borland HQ to pick up engineers for interviews on their lunch breaks. Borland sued, Microsoft settled for many millions, but basically instead of buying their rival outright (for assimilation into the Borg, lol), they just bought the talent. Last I knew Borland had changed names at least twice (Inprise, Embarcadero) and still existed, in some remnant form.

subroutine 5y ago
What was the basis of the lawsuit?
- eatonphil 5y ago
  > Saying that he "just wants Microsoft to leave us alone," Borland International (BORL) CEO Delbert Yocam today filed a lawsuit against Microsoft (MSFT), claiming that the software giant is hiring away Borland's key employees to put it out of business. https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/borland-sues-microsoft-over-brain-drain/ https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/borland-sues...
- Jabbles 5y ago
  "In the past 30 months, Microsoft has hired at least 34 of Borland's top software architects, engineers, and marketing managers", according to a complaint prepared by Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. These actions have been undertaken “for wrongful purposes: to acquire Borland confidential information and to inhibit Borland's competitive position,” the filing states. Borland's lawsuit seeks unspecified financial damages and an immediate end to Microsoft's unfair practice of targeting Borland employees in order to hamper the company's ability to compete. The suit claims that Microsoft's activities are illegal under California Business & Professions Code Section 17200. https://www.eetimes.com/borland-sues-microsoft-for-unfair-competition/ https://www.eetimes.com/borland-sues-microsoft-for-unfair-co...
romeros 5y ago
Ruthless. Just pure evil to target one specific company like that!
- WJW 5y ago
  Why do you think they only targeted Borland like that?
  - wombatmobile 5y ago
    Because the objective of Microsoft's recruitment was not just to acquire talent, it was to diminish their leading competitor.
  - Spooky23 5y ago
    MS was trying to pivot away from their 90s platforms, and Borland was a potential destination for customers jumping ship from stuff like VB. It was a different time. Even dinosaurs like IBM were still competitive in some verticals.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    In a nutshell: Because Borland, more than anyone else, had hugely superior development tools (compilers and IDEs) for Windows.
- Ansil849 5y ago
  You're acting like the employees were forced into the limos at gunpoint. People have free volition. Offering someone a better opportunity is not remotely 'evil'.
  - Lammy 5y ago
    "What's wrong with this country? Can't a man walk down the street without being offered a job‽" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDbvVFffWV4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDbvVFffWV4
    - tinalumfoil 5y ago
jamespo 5y ago
Amusingly Steve Ballmer got the hump when MS engineers started leaving for Google
- nostrademons 5y ago
  As did Google when Google engineers started leaving for Facebook, and FB when their engineers started leaving for Uber/Lyft/AirBnB/Stripe/Coinbase/etc, and so on. It's pretty much a revolving door now, where many engineers have worked at all these companies and sometimes even come back to their home base. CA's prohibition against non-competes and the DoJ's lawsuit against anti-poaching agreements is basically what makes Silicon Valley work.
  - llampx 5y ago
    Not that the giants haven't tried to be a cartel when it comes to labor. Including Jobs at Apple.
  - jamespo 5y ago
    Oh that definitely happened, but we don't have quotes from Google like this: Prior to joining Google, I set up a meeting on or about November 11, 2004 with Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer to discuss my planned departure….At some point in the conversation Mr. Ballmer said: “Just tell me it’s not Google.” I told him it was Google. At that point, Mr. Ballmer picked up a chair and threw it across the room hitting a table in his office. Mr. Ballmer then said: “F---ing Eric Schmidt is a f---ing p--sy. I’m going to f---ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I’m going to f---ing kill Google.”
Kye 5y ago
I remember I started getting a bunch of emails from an "Embarcadero." I didn't remember subscribing, and the unsubscribe didn't work, so I just wrote a filter to skip the inbox and send them all to spam. I must have subscribed to something from Borland at some point.
Tozen 5y ago
Borland sold their software division to Embarcadero, which appears to have been a big payday for top execs as they jumped out. However, Embarcadero did do a decent job of keeping the ship afloat and running things, though Delphi got very expensive. Idera then bought Embarcadero, but appears to allow it to have a high level of autonomy.
- eitland 5y ago
  Another maybe interesting detail: At some point there was an attempted pivot as well or maybe it was just what Embarcadero always had focused on. I wasn't yet working in software then I think but there was an interview or paid article or something I think were someone told that the future of software laid not in languages and IDEs but in Software Lifecycle Management. In a way they were right: Today all major languages have free and open source implementations and Atlassian and a few others seems to have found larger or smaller sweet spots in what I think is Software Lifecycle Management or something. That said what could Borland do at that point? It probably felt worse for them to bet the farm but in my opinion it absolutely isn't the most bone headed moveI have seen. That said: The ads not so long after for "Delphi con" or something similar with large "No toothbrush required", that didn't exactly seem smart to me. I think by then everyone who used their products were grown up serious business programmers.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    > At some point there was an attempted pivot as well or maybe it was just what Embarcadero always had focused on. [...] that the future of software laid not in languages and IDEs but in Software Lifecycle Management. That was after they'd changed their name from Borland to Inprise, before they sold out to Embarcadero. I think that, in contrast to this, Embarcadero still bought them mainly for the IDEs.
    - CRConrad 5y ago
      > I think that, in contrast to this, Embarcadero still bought them mainly for the IDEs. Indeed, seems it was the dev tools division Emba bought. Maybe the ALM div is still around. Hm, have I actually heard somewhere they even switched the name or that back from Inprise to Borland, or am I imagining it? Naah, can't be -- 't'would be both too pathetic and too absurd.
MichaelMoser123 5y ago
Interesting, do they make a similar effort to hire IntelliJ staff? I mean they could offer a much higher sallary than what they would get in Russia. Or is it all due to having the top guy, who is in the know on who-is-who?

subroutine 5y ago

What was the basis of the lawsuit?

eatonphil 5y ago
> Saying that he "just wants Microsoft to leave us alone," Borland International (BORL) CEO Delbert Yocam today filed a lawsuit against Microsoft (MSFT), claiming that the software giant is hiring away Borland's key employees to put it out of business. https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/borland-sues-microsoft-over-brain-drain/ https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/borland-sues...
Jabbles 5y ago
"In the past 30 months, Microsoft has hired at least 34 of Borland's top software architects, engineers, and marketing managers", according to a complaint prepared by Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. These actions have been undertaken “for wrongful purposes: to acquire Borland confidential information and to inhibit Borland's competitive position,” the filing states. Borland's lawsuit seeks unspecified financial damages and an immediate end to Microsoft's unfair practice of targeting Borland employees in order to hamper the company's ability to compete. The suit claims that Microsoft's activities are illegal under California Business & Professions Code Section 17200. https://www.eetimes.com/borland-sues-microsoft-for-unfair-competition/ https://www.eetimes.com/borland-sues-microsoft-for-unfair-co...

romeros 5y ago

Ruthless. Just pure evil to target one specific company like that!

WJW 5y ago
Why do you think they only targeted Borland like that?
- wombatmobile 5y ago
  Because the objective of Microsoft's recruitment was not just to acquire talent, it was to diminish their leading competitor.
- Spooky23 5y ago
  MS was trying to pivot away from their 90s platforms, and Borland was a potential destination for customers jumping ship from stuff like VB. It was a different time. Even dinosaurs like IBM were still competitive in some verticals.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  In a nutshell: Because Borland, more than anyone else, had hugely superior development tools (compilers and IDEs) for Windows.
Ansil849 5y ago
You're acting like the employees were forced into the limos at gunpoint. People have free volition. Offering someone a better opportunity is not remotely 'evil'.
- Lammy 5y ago
  "What's wrong with this country? Can't a man walk down the street without being offered a job‽" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDbvVFffWV4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDbvVFffWV4
  - tinalumfoil 5y ago

jamespo 5y ago

Amusingly Steve Ballmer got the hump when MS engineers started leaving for Google

nostrademons 5y ago
As did Google when Google engineers started leaving for Facebook, and FB when their engineers started leaving for Uber/Lyft/AirBnB/Stripe/Coinbase/etc, and so on. It's pretty much a revolving door now, where many engineers have worked at all these companies and sometimes even come back to their home base. CA's prohibition against non-competes and the DoJ's lawsuit against anti-poaching agreements is basically what makes Silicon Valley work.
- llampx 5y ago
  Not that the giants haven't tried to be a cartel when it comes to labor. Including Jobs at Apple.
- jamespo 5y ago
  Oh that definitely happened, but we don't have quotes from Google like this: Prior to joining Google, I set up a meeting on or about November 11, 2004 with Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer to discuss my planned departure….At some point in the conversation Mr. Ballmer said: “Just tell me it’s not Google.” I told him it was Google. At that point, Mr. Ballmer picked up a chair and threw it across the room hitting a table in his office. Mr. Ballmer then said: “F---ing Eric Schmidt is a f---ing p--sy. I’m going to f---ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I’m going to f---ing kill Google.”

Kye 5y ago

I remember I started getting a bunch of emails from an "Embarcadero." I didn't remember subscribing, and the unsubscribe didn't work, so I just wrote a filter to skip the inbox and send them all to spam. I must have subscribed to something from Borland at some point.

Tozen 5y ago

Borland sold their software division to Embarcadero, which appears to have been a big payday for top execs as they jumped out. However, Embarcadero did do a decent job of keeping the ship afloat and running things, though Delphi got very expensive. Idera then bought Embarcadero, but appears to allow it to have a high level of autonomy.

eitland 5y ago
Another maybe interesting detail: At some point there was an attempted pivot as well or maybe it was just what Embarcadero always had focused on. I wasn't yet working in software then I think but there was an interview or paid article or something I think were someone told that the future of software laid not in languages and IDEs but in Software Lifecycle Management. In a way they were right: Today all major languages have free and open source implementations and Atlassian and a few others seems to have found larger or smaller sweet spots in what I think is Software Lifecycle Management or something. That said what could Borland do at that point? It probably felt worse for them to bet the farm but in my opinion it absolutely isn't the most bone headed moveI have seen. That said: The ads not so long after for "Delphi con" or something similar with large "No toothbrush required", that didn't exactly seem smart to me. I think by then everyone who used their products were grown up serious business programmers.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  > At some point there was an attempted pivot as well or maybe it was just what Embarcadero always had focused on. [...] that the future of software laid not in languages and IDEs but in Software Lifecycle Management. That was after they'd changed their name from Borland to Inprise, before they sold out to Embarcadero. I think that, in contrast to this, Embarcadero still bought them mainly for the IDEs.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    > I think that, in contrast to this, Embarcadero still bought them mainly for the IDEs. Indeed, seems it was the dev tools division Emba bought. Maybe the ALM div is still around. Hm, have I actually heard somewhere they even switched the name or that back from Inprise to Borland, or am I imagining it? Naah, can't be -- 't'would be both too pathetic and too absurd.

MichaelMoser123 5y ago

Interesting, do they make a similar effort to hire IntelliJ staff? I mean they could offer a much higher sallary than what they would get in Russia. Or is it all due to having the top guy, who is in the know on who-is-who?