Oracle takes on Hurd

Oracle Corp has hired former Hewlett-Packard Company chief executive Mark Hurd to help lead the database software maker in a pivotal moment in Oracle's 33-year history as it tries to move in on more of HP's turf.

Oracle and HP are long-time partners but Hurd's appointment Monday, as co-president of Oracle, underscores the growing fissure between the Silicon Valley heavyweights and stems from Oracle CEO Larry Ellison's belief that his friend Hurd was railroaded out of a job at HP.

Oracle already had two presidents.

One of them - Charles Phillips, a former Marine and investment banker who was with Oracle for seven years - is resigning to make room for Hurd.

The other - Safra Catz, Oracle's former chief financial officer - is staying.

Ellison said that Phillips wanted to leave in December, but that Ellison asked him to stay through the integration of Sun Microsystems.

Phillips was in the news earlier this year when pictures of him snuggling with his former mistress appeared on billboards around the US. Ellison said Oracle will miss Phillips' talent and leadership but that he respects Phillips' decision to leave.

Oracle said in a statement that Hurd will also serve as a member of the board of directors. He will report to Ellison.

HP and Oracle have worked together for 25 years to make sure their products are in sync. The relationship is straining because Oracle is now competing in one of HP's biggest businesses - selling the computer servers that power businesses' back offices.

Hurd's new job is evidence that Oracle plans to push harder into more areas where Oracle's and HP's businesses overlap.

Don't expect a break-up between HP and Oracle over the friction, though, since their technologies are so intertwined.

In hiring Hurd, Oracle doesn't necessarily get everything he knows. Part of Hurd's severance package from HP - which could top US$40 million - includes a confidentiality agreement that restricts what he can tell a future employer about internal HP dealings.

Still, what Oracle is getting is Hurd's ability to steer a sprawling technology company and find ways to make it even bigger.

HP cleared US$114 billion in revenue in its last fiscal year, while Oracle had nearly US$27 billion.

Hurd is being tapped as Oracle undergoes a similar transformation to the one he spearheaded in his five years atop HP.

Oracle is in a richly profitable business as the No. 1 seller of database software, but is trying to carve out territory in other areas.

Oracle has been on a US$40 billion buying binge since 2004, scooping up companies in other parts of the business software market, and with the US$7.4 billion deal for Sun last year, became a direct competitor to HP in computing hardware, specifically servers.

Hurd presided over a similarly massive makeover at HP, where he engineered more than US$20 billion in acquisitions.

Technology services

Those deals helped HP become less tethered to printer ink as the source of the bulk of its profits. HP is now a player in technology services - where it is battling IBM Corp - and computer networking - where it is taking on Cisco Systems Inc, which is also now making its own servers and challenging HP in that market.

Hurd, 53, resigned a month ago from HP following a sexual harassment investigation, which unearthed inaccurate expense reports connected with Hurd's outings with his eventual accuser, an actress and HP contractor named Jodie Fisher.

She claimed that her work helping organise HP events dried up after she rebuffed Hurd's advances.

Hurd, who is married with two children, denies making any advances on Fisher. Hurd also insists he didn't prepare his own expenses and did not try to conceal his outings with Fisher, which often included dinner after the events Fisher helped organise and that Hurd attended.

HP has emphasised that its board voted unanimously for Hurd's resignation.

- AP