7 ms·
Oracle Calls Out Autonomy CEO
- j_col 15y agoFrom the statement: > Mr. Lynch then accused of Oracle of being ‘inaccurate’. Either Mr. Lynch has a very poor memory or he’s lying. Wow, things are really getting dirty between Oracle, HP, and Autonomy. Wonder will this affect HP's embattled share price further?
- tybris 15y agoIt seems that things always get pretty dirty when Oracle is involved, but maybe they're just being honest.
- haasted 15y agoOther HN discussion on the same topic : http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3051366 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3051366
- DrJokepu 15y agoThis is incredibly juvenile and unprofessional. Start acting like grownups.
- 5hoom 15y agoAgreed. This is a really weird press release for Oracle to serve from their flagship website. Even the Notch v Bethesda back & forth was orders of magnitude more civil…
- phillmv 15y agoFor one, Notch vs Bethesda operated at several fewer orders of magnitude. Secondly, Notch is playfully avoiding a lawsuit. Oracle is settling a score.
- JonnieCache 15y agoI for one would pay double to witness an Ellison vs. Lynch q3a showdown.
- castewart 15y agoThis! We'll watch it on Chill.com and serve e-popcorn
- tptacek 15y agoEllison knows it's juvenile and unprofessional and does not care. That is his schtick.
- tluyben2 15y agoYes, he is known for this kind of thing. Works for him apparently and has been for many years. It's not like he is able to 'fail' in a lot of senses of the word anymore; he is rich beyond believe, he has great business sense, he is a winner on a number of levels. Why would he care about anything, especially anything said in the tech community?
- X-Istence 15y agoIf only Mr. Lynch had just come out and said, "yes, we also went to Oracle to see if they might be interested". Then he would have had much less trouble =)
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- marcf 15y agoWhy does Oracle care so much about this? Autonomy shopped themselves around and Oracle turned them down. Now Oracle wants to hurt Autonomy because a competitor bought them. I guess all is fair in M&A, but this just seems like a stupid spat.
- reefab 15y agoI'm guessing it's mostly Mark Hurd (Oracle president and ex-HP CEO) trying to look good by pointing out that he did refuse to buy Autonomy because the price he was discussing with them was overpriced in his opinion whereas HP bought them for almost twice the price. It's basically Mark Hurd getting back at HP in the most pathetic way I've ever seen.
- itswindy 15y agoI remember reading that Ellison takes a lot of things personally .
- mikeryan 15y agoBack Story (since I apparently missed it) HP is buying Autonomy for 10+B. Many analysts feel this is over priced, and on Oracle's earnings call Larry Ellison couldn't help but get a jab in at HP by saying that they (Mark Hurd ironically) told Autonomy they were overpriced at their current 6+B Market Cap when Autonomy went to Oracle looking for a suitor. Autonomy CEO then said "WTF we never talked to Oracle about being purchased". Then this.
- smoyer 15y agoThanks ... Though it appears the real story is that the sandbox isn't big for both of them and now they're throwing sand in each other's eyes.
- joezydeco 15y agoI see it more as Mark Hurd's way of giving the HP board of directors a huge middle finger.
- darksaga 15y agoI thought the fact the meeting took place on April 1st was entertaining. Maybe Hurd missed the joke?
- demallien 15y agoYes. It does give Autonomy an easy out: "Sure Oracle, we did pitch selling ourselves to you - on the morning of April 1st! Didn't you get the joke?!?! Joke aside, the meeting was indeed as we described in our first response." Either that, or the two companies are actually having a joke at our (tech industry watchers) expense.
- protomyth 15y agoIf Autonomy's CEO said it was an April Fools joke, then HP and himself would not look very good in front of Wall Street or stock holders. There might actually be SEC complications also.
- freejack 15y agoI find it ridiculous that companies operating at this level waste their time with things like this when they clearly have bigger issues on their hands. No wonder Oracle is struggling if this is where they are focused.
- amac 15y agoIs Oracle struggling? They certainly aren't struggling to make profit.
- freejack 15y agoNew software license sales and renewals are both down year-over-year as a percentage of overall sales. It might just be a blip, but I read it as a weakness in their core business. I think the size of the enterprise segment is shrinking - as Andreesen pointed out recently, it was pretty common ten years ago for startups to sink tons of cash into Oracle licenses. Nowadays, it doesn't happen at all. Internet-scale is no longer equivalent to enterprise scale, and less companies are buying Oracle as a result. Elsewhere, government sales are slowing as a result of global fiscal restraint, which basically leaves Fortune 500 to carry the water for Oracle. So yeah, "struggling" might be a bit over-the-top, I certainly wouldn't be betting on Oracle as a breakout story. They are probably a business in decline, and most likely to end up in a similar spot as SGI, DEC and tons of other former enterprise powerhouses that saw their core business diminished by the relentless commoditization that comes with advances in technology.
- jijoy 15y agoThere is 12% increase in New Software Licenses for Oracle , as per released data in last FY.
- itswindy 15y agoAndreesen pointed out recently, it was pretty common ten years ago for startups to sink tons of cash into Oracle And Andreessen should be listened in this field because.... ? Serious corporations go for IBM, Oracle, SAP and the likes. They want stability and someone to show up and fix when things go wrong. Most of the 'startups' Marc is talking about, will be not be here 5 years from now. What was Marc's last good investment? Ning or Groupon?
- forgotAgain 15y agoPossible scenario for Oracle actions: A) ridicule HP into dropping Autonomy bid B) because of A the stock price of HP drops significantly C) Oracle buys HP D) Mark Hurd gets his HP executive washroom key back.
- spinchange 15y agoE) HP keeps PSG in house and backs off Enterprise software and services.
- toyg 15y agoWhat about this? (not a joke) A) ridicule HP into dropping Autonomy bid B) because of A, the stock price of Autonomy crashes C) Oracle buys Autonomy D) Mike Lynch gets fired
- rbanffy 15y ago> A) ridicule HP into dropping Autonomy bid I don't think Oracle would do anything to benefit HP
- eftpotrm 15y agoI forget where, but I once read an article suggesting that one of the big problems Microsoft has faced in the past 10 years is that, after the DoJ suit and the ruling of it as an abusive monopoly by Judge Jackson, they missed out on a lot of good new developers simply because they didn't want to work for that sort of company. I don't think my opinions of Larry Ellison had been high for some time, but recent actions and publishing this sort of press release hardly raises them. Perhaps this will be the final downfall of Oracle; that their reputation in the tech community so precedes them that they run out of willing labour and / or partners?
- toyg 15y agoDo you really think Larry cares about what some uppity yankee hipster thinks about his company? These days, a lot (most?) of Oracle software is built in India, Eastern Europe, etc. Developers in those countries don't care about this sort of things, they care about the cold hard cash Oracle have in their coffers, which they get by selling products over geeks' heads (i.e. to their bosses' boss). Wage inflation in developing countries is much more of a problem for Larry than "boardroom etiquette".
- hexis 15y agoyankee?
- eftpotrm 15y agoYes, as a Brit I was quite surprised about that ;-) As for the other side, there's not just the issue of who builds for them but who builds with them. If the industry perception of Oracle becomes establised that they're awkward, litigious and have an attitude problem, who's going to buy the licenses and build products against their platform?
- toyg 15y ago[ I'm sure in Larry's eyes "uppity yankee hipsters" and "uppity brit hipsters" are equivalent ;) ] I don't think they have a reputation for being awkward with their own customers/partners/etc; they're unashamedly merciless with competitors, and this is well known. In the enterprise sector the two categories often overlap, but then again in those circles being a shark is actually considered a good thing anyway. At the moment their target is squarely HP, like SAP before them, and this is what it means. It's actually mildly amusing, if you've followed the whole saga with Apotheker living on a plane etc.
- phillmv 15y agoThe most interesting thing about this story is just how poor that Powerpoint presentation is. It's professionally put together, but if I someone tried to use these as slides during a presentation I'd want to tear my eyes out.
- bennylope 15y agoIt's classic consulting/finance style, typically meant to be read as a document (a "leave behind") rather than presented on a screen. This does not stop consultants from presenting such decks. And yes, those presentations will make you want to tear your eyes out.
- protomyth 15y agoI pretty much expect this would be Oracle's response, they tend not to let others have the last word on such things. It is pretty interesting to me that during the SPARC SuperCluster event, Ellison did not mention HP, but instead focussed heavily on IBM's server.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- goodweeds 15y agoIt appears that Oracle has been taking PR lessons from Michael Arrington.
- headbiznatch 15y agoThe funniest part of the press release for me is the "About Oracle" section: "Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) is the world's most complete, open, and integrated business software and hardware systems company." Put it on every release, it will become true? Or something?
- loglog1234 15y agoOracle Open World next week, any PR is good PR
- MaysonL 15y agoOf course, if you look at the other side of the story, Oracle is said to be tossing lots of BS here. See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/sep/29/autonomy-oracle http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/sep/29/autonomy-orac... Slides prepared by Qatalyst in January, meeting between Autonomy and Hurd as an introduction, not a sales pitch.