Ellison On Oracle’s Takeover Targets

"Whether or not Oracle wins its hostile takeover of PeopleSoft, one thing is for sure: Larry Ellison is acquisition hungry." reports Michael Singer for InternetNews.com. "But the motivation for doing so may not be to battle top-tier market leader SAP, but rather to take away mid-market business from Microsoft and IBM, according to analysts surveyed by internetnews.com. In a video deposition Monday, the CEO said he considered as many as eight different acquisition targets, including Siebel, BEA, Systems, Business Objects, Lausanne Software, Corner Corp, SunGuard SCT, Documentum (eventually acquired by EMC) and J.D. Edwards (acquired by PeopleSoft) ... Dominy [director of Enterprise Services at research firm Yankee Group] said there have been rumors that Oracle is exploring acquisitions in the consulting and systems integration space. "This strategy would also help Oracle match up better with IBM"

More from Laurie J. Flynn at CRMBuyer: "Lawrence Ellison, chief executive of Oracle, testified at his company's antitrust trial that Microsoft's strategy of driving down prices was a crucial reason Oracle had moved to take over PeopleSoft. Ellison also said that Oracle was continuing to consider three or four other acquisitions, even with its bid for PeopleSoft still pending. He declined to name the companies but said they were all publicly traded and included a business applications company, a company involved in "business intelligence" [my emphasis] and a software infrastructure provider. In a taped deposition last week, Ellison listed BEA Systems, Siebel Systems and Lawson Software as past takeover candidates."