Oracle Drops Siebel Bomb On PDC
And with that on Monday morning, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison completely pre-empted Microsoft's semi-annual PDC developers show and any news that might be forthcoming.
The timing was clearly not fortuitous. A traditional (boring) company might have waited for its big users show--Oracle OpenWorld is next week. But noooooo Ellison dropped the bomb just as PDC is gearing up in L.A.
Super genius.
Not that this deal hadn't been bandied about for years, it's just that you had to wonder how far even Ellison was willing to go in pursuit of unseating SAP as biz apps kingpin. (Oh and stick it to Microsoft).
The answer is, pretty damn far. After writing a check for more than $10 billion big ones for PeopleSoft (and J.D. Edwards), and spending comparative petty cash on TimesTen, Oblix, parts of Context Media etc., Larry and the gang have gone for the gusto in Siebel Systems and its CRM expertise. Oh yeah, and Seibel's two-plus billion in cash.
Siebel, by the way, has allied itself with both IBM and Microsoft on middleware. Wonder where that strategy is headed now?
And, imagine the psychodrama going on behind the scenes between Ellison and former protegeTom Siebel. Oof.
An added benefit is it distracts from Salesforce.com's big announcment event kicking off today in San Francisco. Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff wasted no time sending out his take: "Oracle put Siebel investors out of their misery today. We have been doing that for Siebel customers for years."
Cynics might also say this news overshadows reports of Ellison settling a 2001 insider trading case. Check out this New York Times story which reports Ellison may settle with yet another big check: This one a $100 million to charity. Interesting.