Another big software company – BEA – is being consumed by Oracle today. While some people will say this goes back three months to the first offer Oracle made for BEA, the idea has been floating around for a long time. I quickly found a priceless article about it online in Linux World from 3/16/04 (republished on Java.net).
Facing almost certain defeat in its pursuit of PeopleSoft, Oracle is eyeing other candidates and possibly BEA. "Faced with a tough, if not losing, battle for PeopleSoft, Oracle executives said Thursday that they were considering other acquisitions… Henley (CFO, Chairman) said Oracle had been ‘looking at a variety of areas’ but didn’t identify any potential takeover targets. It has expressed interest in BEA as well as reserve over the price.
"Facing almost certain defeat" eh? Oracle apparently does not subscribe to the thesis that failure is an option.