On the mergers and acquisitions news, last week there was buzz on Oracle making a cash bid of $6.7B for BEA Systems. For those who do not know about BEA Systems, it is a leading provider of application software for computer servers. In the late 1990s, it did a lot of partnerships with Symantec Corporation, and even made some acquisitions and joint ventures of its own. It is surprising to hear of big companies these days getting acquired.
Oracle’s bid comes at the heals of news about SAP buying Business Objects S.A. Did Oracle want to buy Business Objects and now goes after BEA as a second choice? After all, the founder of Business Objects came from Oracle, and Oracle has been making buys of people who left Oracle to start their own companies such as Siebel and PeopleSoft.
Oracle’s bid for BEA was 25% higher than BEA closing stock price. Was it a smart offering price? Would another company be better-suited to buy BEA? BEA does not seem to be known for software like the other players Oracle recently bought, such as Hyperion. It is more known for its platforms.
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