An Improved Offer by Oracle Captures BEA Systems
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Oracle has finally won its prize, the rival BEA Systems, after sweetening the offer by 14 percent, just three months after BEA rejected its original bid.
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BEA Systems Inc. is planning to release this week a new version of its application suite targeted at its ISV partners. WebLogic Platform ISV Edition is an integrated suite that features core BEA technology
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As it cools its heels waiting for a response from BEA Systems, Oracle announces plan to buy the operational planning software maker.
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Identity management Oracle is bulking up its system security capabilities through the acquisition of privately held Bharosa for an undisclosed sum. Bharosa software will control and secure access to systems built with Oracle applications and middleware.â¦
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On paper, Oracle?s recent $6.7 billion offer for BEA Systems looks a lot like the hostile bid for PeopleSoft four years ago ? a bad-for-competition, bad-for-employees, bad-for-customers deal designed with one goal in mind: fatten Oracle shareholders? wallets by taking out a competitor.
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It appears something positive has emerged from the recent mass exodus of executives from BEA Systems. On Tuesday, three former BEA executives, with the help of two venture-capital heavyweights, launched a
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BEA agreed to be acquired by Oracle for $8.5 billion, three months after rejecting the database vendor's $6.7 billion offer.
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Search reality check From BEA Systems and its soon-to-be owner Oracle, from mighty IBM to a myriad of social network and online office start-ups, vendors have been telling us how the "Google generation" and Web 2.0 will change the way we work. Many have been flogging applications and middleware products, strategies and marketing puff to back this up.â¦
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SAN FRANCISCO - Oracle Corp. , the third-largest software maker, gave BEA Systems Inc.'s directors five days to consider a $6.7 billion takeover offer before it expires. BEA said it can't accept Oracle's price.
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BEA Systems&#39; largest shareholder is demanding that its board of directors allow shareholders to vote on a&#160;$17-per-share purchase offer from Oracle, which is set to expire at 5 p.m. Pacific Time Sunday.Carl Icahn, who holds more than 58 million shares of BEA stock, said in a statement that he has begun lawsuit proceedings in Delaware to force an annual shareholder meeting &quot;before any scorched earth transactions (such as stock issuances, asset sales, acquisitions or similar occurrences) take place at BEA, other than transactions that are approved by shareholders.&quot;The investor accused BEA&#39;s board of intending &quot;to find ways to derail a sale and maintain your control of the company.&quot;&#160;BEA&#39;s board has repeatedly rejected Oracle&#39;s bid&#160;to buy the company,&#160;demanding $21 per share. Oracle&#39;s offer amounts to $6.7 billion, while BEA&#39;s demand works out to $8.3 billion. Oracle has called that price &quot;impossibly high.&quot;Icahn said BEA can avoid litigation if it conducts an auction sale, allowing shareholders to consider offers from the highest bidder.&quot;BEA should not allow the stalking horse bid from Oracle to disappear (failure to take the Oracle bid as a stalking horse would be a grave dereliction of your fiduciary duty in my view),&quot; he wrote. &quot;But if no topping bid arises it should be up to the BEA shareholders to decide whether to take the Oracle bid or remain as an independent Company.&quot;Icahn also demanded that &quot;BEA should agree not to take any action that would dilute voting by issuing stock, entrench management or derail a potential sale of BEA.&quot;Shares of BEA stock closed at $16.50 and were trading at $16.75 after hours on Friday.A BEA spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.
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Given the silence from the BEA Systems and Oracle camps early this week about Oracle's unsolicited proposal to buy its middleware rival, the community at large can only sit back and guess what might be the next scene in this drama.The two companies have been keeping quiet since last Friday's blockbuster revelation that Oracle was seeking to acquire BEA for $17 per share, or about $6.7 billion. Both have spurned requests this week for media briefings to elaborate on the issue.Undoubtedly, much is taking place behind the scenes, as aggressive Oracle seeks to add BEA to the impressive list of formerly independent companies it has acquired, which has included, among others, PeopleSoft and Siebel Systems. BEA, meanwhile, also has to be pondering its next step.Officials at Sun Microsystems, which invented the Java platform that serves as the backbone of many BEA and Oracle products, seemed to be caught off-guard when asked about the proposed merger at a Sun event in San Francisco on Tuesday evening.Chuckling, Rich Green, Sun executive vice president of software, suggested contacting Oracle CEO Larry Ellison about the matter. But when asked what impacts might be felt by the Java platform itself, Green did not see any negative effects."They're both Java supporters," Green said. "I think it's neutral to Java. I think it's just fine."Sun's James Gosling, a founder of Java and chief technology officer for Sun's client software group, concurred. "They're both big supporters of Java. I don't think it's going to have much effect one way or the other," Gosling said.Oracle has pledged to protect investments customers have made in BEA products. While Oracle's move has been characterized in some circles as a hostile takeover attempt, BEA's initial response merely said the Oracle offer undervalued the company.Major BEA stockholder Carl Icahn has been prodding for a sale of BEA, prompting one BEA insider to suggest Icahn did not have enough shares and would have a hard time getting control of the BEA board of directors in order to make the sale happen. Now, Oracle has forced BEA's hand. If history is any indication, the sale is likely to happen. PeopleSoft opposed Oracle but eventually succumbed."We certainly saw how persistent Oracle was in chasing PeopleSoft," said Dennis Callaghan, enterprise software analyst at the 451 Group, who expects the merger to be completed.Options for BEA to resist Oracle may be limited. To take the company private and avoid a merger, BEA would need to find a private equity partner, Callaghan said. And then there is Icahn, owning a significant stake in the company and wanting the company sold."It's not like [BEA CEO and co-founder] Alfred Chuang can regain control of the company and take it private. He's got to make his shareholders happy," said Callaghan.Even BEA employees could profit on a merger if they bought stock at a discounted price and then were able to sell it at an inflated price as a result of a merger, he said.? They might lose their jobs at BEA, but a lot of them would be very employable, winding up with startup ventures, he said.Callaghan added he expects Oracle to increase its offer. HP is a possibility as another potential buyer for BEA, but HP has had troubles of its own integrating acquired companies, such as Peregrine and Bluestone Software, Callaghan saidHe gave credence to the notion that Oracle may be buying BEA to stock up on its middleware offerings as the database market, which has been Oracle's cash cow, now features free, open source offerings from competitors.? "From what I understand, [databases is] not really a growing business at this point, Callaghan said.A dignitary in the Java development space had a mostly positive reaction to the proposed merger."Oracle and BEA both have amazing engineering teams, but Oracle's business operation is clearly many, many times the size and scale of BEA's," said Rick Ross, founder of the Javalobby Web site for Java developers. Having both teams under the same umbrella would create great opportunities for innovation, Ross said. And BEA's technology, such as the JRockit Java Virtual Machine, could become more widely used, he said.But there could be a down side, Ross noted."As the realized market share of a single player moves to such a dominant position, it becomes less and less likely that the startup innovator can gain a foothold," he said.IBM, BEA, and Oracle are battling in what research firm IDC calls the application deployment software space, which is comprised of application servers, integration software, message-oriented middleware and transaction processing monitors. This market space, valued at $9.4 billion in 2006, is growing at nearly 18 percent year over year because of trends in integration, business process management, and SOA, said Maureen Fleming, IDC program director.When including software mainframes, IBM last year had a 36 percent market share, valued at $3.3 billion. BEA trailed with 11 percent or $1 billion, and Oracle had 9 percent, or $850 million. The figures include license and maintenance revenuesWhen leaving out mainframe software, the market size dropped to $6.5 billion, with IBM still leading with a 20 percent market share, or $1.3 billion and Oracle garnering 13 percent or $850,000. BEA came in right behind Oracle with 12 percent or $840,000.
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The tech world is still buzzing about announcements by Sun Microsystems that it will acquire MySQL AB and by Oracle that it will acquire BEA Systems. The deals muddle the middleware market, according to some analysts.
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Business software maker BEA Systems Inc  has agreed to be acquired by Oracle Corp  for $8.5 billion, a 14 percent premium to its first offer, the companies said on Wednesday.
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Oracle has agreed to buy BEA Systems for about $8.5 billion, or $19.375 per share, the companies announced.
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BEA Systems Inc  said on Thursday it is prepared to sell itself for $8.2 billion, which is a 24 percent premium to a bid from Oracle Corp  that the business software maker rejected.
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Oracle continues to snap up smaller software companies even while it battles to acquire middleware vendor BEA. On Wednesday Oracle said it had agreed to buy Interlace Systems, which makes operations planning software, for an undisclosed price.
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The board of BEA Systems Inc   said on Monday that it is still looking at ways to maximize  shareholder value, including the possible sale of the company,  after a bid from Oracle Corp  expired on Sunday.