Federal Judge Rules Oracle can Bid for PeopleSoft

terrymaster69 writes "The NY Times reports (free reg, required) that Oracle may have the go ahead to continue its hostile bidding for PeopleSoft. The Justice Department had previously tried to paint the merger as anti-competitive in the corporate services software market. 'Judge Vaughn R. Walker of the Federal District Court in San Francisco rejected the government's definition of the market as too narrow, noting that the software business is particularly dynamic, with a host of current and emerging competitors in that area including Microsoft.'"

Comments

Well, this is just great.

[senatorpjt]

There's a HRMS from PeopleSoft at work to handle payroll, the thing doesn't work as it is, and this certainly isn't going to help.

It's a good thing I still demand my paychecks printed on a piece of paper in an envelope I can carry to the bank myself.

Re:Well, this is just great.

[LostCluster]

It's a good thing I still demand my paychecks printed on a piece of paper in an envelope I can carry to the bank myself.

Funny, I perfer "Direct Deposit", "ACH Transfers", and "Online Bill Pay" because when properly configured computer systems move my money, I see there less risk of it going wrong. Paper checks can get lost in transit and take several days to clear, but with electronic transfers the transaction clears instantly and I get access to the money that's rightfully mine immediately rather than having to wait up to a week for processing to happen.

well

[nial-in-a-box]

Anything that kills PeopleSoft is a good thing. I don't care how many people use it or how well it may work for some people, it is the Windows of its market (i.e. poorly made, difficult to support, and unreliable as hell, especially when not configured perfectly).

while I do not want to see Oracle get People Soft,

[WindBourne]

it struck me odd that this admin all but drop the MS case, but wase persuing this one. Too be honest, the admin had little to no chance of winning it, as SAP is the big boy and MS is looming.

But I have wondering why they did persue this one? hummm. payoffs anybody?

not out of the woods

[Anonymous Coward]

First point is that this has nothing to do with databases. It is to do with ERP apps of which there are currently 3 major players: SAP, Oracle and Peoplesoft. If Oracle is successful there will be two. Hard to see how this is not less competition, though SAP is so much the market leader that the Oralce/Peoplesoft combined company might be useful to their customers. Its worth noting that Oracle still faces an EU investigation into the bid and, if successful, will to overcome an implacably hostile Peoplesoft board, oh, and gain the support of shareholders for its $7.7bn bid. Also the DoJ has 60 days to appeal Judge Walker's decision.

Re:Point

[Ronald Dumsfeld]

Well, I think they do have a point there... there is plenty of competition around in the database market, and Oracle would still have to compete in a 'real' way - as far as I can see they can't be able to abuse their market position, simply because there's enough competition.

This ain't about competition in the database market, it's about competition for ERP software. These work on top of a database, and many ERP packages allow you to choose the underlying database.

I think this is a dreadful decision, Oracle's ERP offering is horrid, and the intent is simply to kill a competitor. If the takeover does go through I hope the clients Oracle is hoping to acquire go elsewhere. What is even more scary is to discover that Microsoft has considered buying SAP. That would instantly give MS a huge market share in back-end business software. You can bet that SAP on non-MS platforms wouldn't be kept up to date with features despite the fact that it runs like a two-legged dog when implemented on Windows.