Summary
Latest warnings from EU trade commissioner in Brussels Neelie Kroes re Oracle's Sun takeover bid alleging lack of compelling beneficial evidence on part of Oracle in the midst of boastings from Oracle CEO Larry Ellison about their competitive edge vis-a-vis IBM ,does not augur well in the marketplace.
Instead it has damaged Sun's market position ( as mentioned in my previous comments -) as Sun has announced loss of 3000 jobs amidst loss of market share/revenue and gloomier future prospects.
Analysis
1. In my previous analyzes over last few months, ( like EU ) I have always maintained from the beginning that Oracle/Sun takeover brings little to the competitiveness re pricing/quality of service and product innovation in the marketplace-see:
a. 'Oracle -Sun Integration ?' dated 07/23/2009
b. 'Oracle-Sun Integration?-a sequel"dated 07/29/2009
c. 'Oracle/Sun Integration revisited- a triIogy"dated 09/08/2009
2. Oracle Inc. has failed to appease EU commissioner's fears about higher prices and lack of choice in the midst of poor product quality,in spite of repeated requests.It has also failed to offer any concrete proposals or hard evidence re any mitigating measures to allay these fears,as per EU.
3. The boastings from Larry Ellison re their Oracle database outperforming on Sun server compared with IBM's DB2 on their hardware by a factor of 2 to 1 was received with a lot of skepticism in the industry. -see
http://websearch.cs.com/cs/boomframe.jsp?query=oracle%2Cmake+my+day&page=1&offset=1&result_url=redir%3Fsrc%3Dwebsearch%26requestId%3D7a568cdd9f1d357%26clickedItemRank%3D1%26userQuery%3Doracle%252Cmake%2Bmy%2Bday%26clickedItemURN%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.nydailynews.com%252Fmoney%252F2009%252F10%252F15%252F2009-10-15_oracles_ceo_to_ibm_come_on_make_my_day.html%26invocationType%3D-%26fromPage%3DCSResultsT%26amp%3BampTest%3D1&remove_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nydailynews.com%2Fmoney%2F2009%2F10%2F15%2F2009-10-15_oracles_ceo_to_ibm_come_on_make_my_day.html
Many claim that this is an attempt by Oracle/Sun to cover up their weak market position and in fact Oracle has been fined USD 10000.00 for making such a claim in advertisements by the Transaction Processing Council ( an independent Industry group with reputation in the marketplace ) without submitting any evidence!!
4. In conclusion, Oracle/Sun takeover/merger faces serious hurdles for approval by EU and even if such an approval is given after a lot of haggling by Oracle ( and at present the chances look minimal !!) ; the interim damage re market share/financial loss ( not to mention loss of reputation in the market place ) by Sun especially would be extremely difficult to recuperate.
