Sun VP Grimes Says Sun Will Benefit From Merger Chaos

"With 9 or ten platforms and architectures between Compaq and Digital and Tandem and Hewlett Packard, as a solution provider you have got to ask yourself where you should be investing your dollars and which of those architectures is going to survive post merger and which one is going to receive R and D dollars going forward," said Grimes. "You don't want to make the wrong bet because if you do it could cost you your company."

The Hewlett Packard vote on the proposed $22 billion acquisition of Compaq is set for tomorrow after a bitter and divisive proxy battle that has pitted HP Chief Executive Carly Fiorina against HP board member Walter Hewlett, the son of HP co-founder William Hewlett.

If the HP-Compaq deal wins shareholder approval, Sun would also benefit from the new combined company's stepped-up focus to build a services business by adding thousands of consultants and services employees who compete with solution providers, while Sun aggressively moves to embrace those partners, said Grimes.

Grimes said his message to HP and Compaq solution providers is to get into the Sun program. "If it gets together, then you have got to ask yourself which partner group is going to last? Which procedures are going to last? Which policies are going to last going forward?" said Grimes. "If it doesn't happen, then nothing is changed except we have injected a lot of time and confusion and energy and diversion into the whole business proposition."

Mark Hanny, vice president of worldwide SMB and partner marketing for the IBM Software Group, said the proposed deal has not had an impact on IBM's software business.

"While it might be mildly interesting it really hasn't had any effect on us at all," he said. "And by the way, as crazy as it sounds, Compaq is one of my partners. They sell a lot of our middleware and Tivoli Storage Manager does great [with Compaq."

When asked if the deal going through could cause Compaq to embrace HP's OpenView rather than IBM's Tivoli, Hanny discounted such a possibility. "They are not the most software driven companies in the world," he said.