Tonight’s statement from Oracle corporate PR vis-a-vis the SAP lawsuit:

“Hewlett Packard has refused to accept service of a subpoena requiring Mr. Apotheker to testify about his role in SAP’s illegal conduct. Mr. Apotheker started work for HP on Monday, but it now appears that the HP Board of Directors has decided to keep him away from HP’s headquarters and outside the court’s jurisdiction. We will continue to try to serve him.”

Oracle served Apotheker because he was CEO of SAP for part of the time during which SAP downloaded proprietary Oracle information.

One of last week’s emails (attributable to Oracle CEO Larry Ellison) warned that something like this just might happen.

“I don’t think [HP chairman] Ray Lane wants to risk Leo Apotheker testifying under oath as to why he allowed the theft of Oracle’s property to continue for 8 months after he was made sole CEO of SAP. I hope I’m wrong, but my guess is that new HP’s Chairman, Mr. Lane, will keep HP’s new CEO, Mr. Apotheker, far, far away from the Courthouse until this trial is over.”

Far, far away, indeed.

Let us know what you think about the story; email Barbara Darrow, Senior News Director at bdarrow@techtarget.com, or follow us on twitter.

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Once again Larry Ellison is weighing in on Hewlett-Packard’s boardroom moves. This time though, he has a real vested interest.

In response to a civil suit HP launched against Mark Hurd, the former HP CEO who is joining Oracle as co-president and director, Ellison issued the following statement:

“Oracle has long viewed HP as an important partner. By filing this vindictive lawsuit against Oracle and Mark Hurd, the HP board is acting with utter disregard for that partnership,our joint customers, and their own shareholders and employees.  The HP board is making it virtually impossible for Oracle and HP to continue to cooperate and work together in the IT marketplace.”   

 

This soap opera unfolds just a week before Oracle OpenWorld opens its doors in San Francisco. Oddly enough, Mark Hurd–as CEO of HP–was slated to keynote already. Now it’s safe to say he will keynote, but as an Oracle insider.

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Within a day of the news that former Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd is joining Oracle as co-president, HP says it’s going to sue the SOB.

The lawsuit was previewed on an HP blog.  Full text here.

Oracle, now home to Sun Microsystems hardware arsenal, is now a direct rival to erstwhile partner HP and the HP board is clearly angry that Hurd took tens of millions in HP severance money and moved up 101 to Oracle’s glass towers in Redwood Shores.

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The latest bombshell is that Oracle is dramatically de-emphasizing OpenSolaris, keeping the best-and-brightest new code for the commercial version of the operating system. Solaris 11 is promised for next year.

That tidbit, gleaned from a leaked internal memo, follows news of a lawsuit Oracle is pursuing against Google over Android’s use (Oracle would say misuse) of Java.

All of this activity seems to validate fears among the open source faithful that Oracle has no intention of being a good steward of Sun’s open-source oriented gems. Of course, Oracle cannot be blamed for wanting to wring revenue and profits from all the tech assets it bought with its $7.4 billion.

What’s upsetting even more Oracle customers, however, is the company’s new support policies. For a good analysis of what’s going on there, check out the Oracle Optimization blog. This guy knows his stuff!

For Sun hardware partners, the impending loss of the Sun hardware renewal business looms large. In case there is any doubt, the following was posted on the Sun Partner Advantage Web site:

Welcome to the Sun Partner Advantage Program global Partner Directory. Use this tool to search for all partners worldwide.PLEASE NOTE: As of October 16, 2010, the Sun Partner Directory will no longer be available. Please visit

 

Oracle PartnerNetwork to learn more about the many new ways Sun partners can work with Oracle to enhance their business. Please visit the Oracle PartnerNetwork Solutions Catalog to find Oracle and Sun solutions.

Inquiring minds, including that of the tipster who mailed in this snippet, want to know in what “new ways” former Sun Resellers can “work with Oracle to enhance their business”?

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In case anyone forgot, Oracle got the Java franchise via its $7.5 billion acquisition of Sun Microsystems. And there has been worry about its stewardship over the popular development language ever since.  Ironically, Google CEO Eric Schmidt was a Sun exec who helped shape that company’s strategy of releasing versions of the language under open source licenses to entrench it in many markets. According to Oracle, Java for Developers, Java for Your Computer, and JavaFX are the three most downloaded items from Oracle’s web site

The suit, filed in the U.S. district court in northern California,  alleges that Google Android infringes upon Java’s patents and copyrights. Kim Polese, a former Sun exec who has since worked long in the open-source trenches, told the Wall Street Journal that the suit is “very perplexing.”

Oracle’s legal team includes superstar David Boies of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, LLP, fresh off his victory in the California Prop 8 case.

This lawsuit sets up a potentially huge battle between the largest enterprise software company  (Oracle) and the largest consumer software company (Google.)

This is the second time in a week that Oracle CEO Larry Ellison appears to be fighting battles for non-Oracle buddies. Earlier he sent an unsolicited letter to The New York Times blasting Hewlett-Packard’s board for forcing out HP CEO Mark Hurd. Observers point out that Ellison is also tight with Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Google’s Android is fast on a pace to pass Apple iPhone sales.

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