Renee Boucher Ferguson

Oracle surprised Wall Street analysts and investors Dec. 20 by reporting better than expected fiscal second-quarter 2008 earnings, particularly in the area of software license revenue, much of which can be attributed to the fact that its acquisition strategy is finally paying off. Oracle announced Dec. 20 that its earnings were up 35 percent to […]

On-demand enterprise resource planning vendor NetSuite said Dec. 26 that it has closed its initial public offering. The much-vaunted IPO, launched Dec. 10, has raised $185.4 million in the sale of 6.2 million shares at $26 each—a take that far exceeds the company’s initial expectations. NetSuite officials said in a Dec. 6 statement that they […]

To reflect its product evolution beyond customer relationship management, Centric CRM announced Dec. 12 it’s changed its name to Concursive. The company also introduced a new suite of products that includes content management and enterprise 2.0 technologies—which Concursive has identified as two new areas of future growth. The new name of the company is derived […]

Leveraging both its acquisition of Symbol Technologies last year and a new partnership forged this year, Motorola plans to go deeper into what is referred to as “extended capability” RFID development. The company announced Dec. 12 a partnership with Intelleflex, a company that develops extended capability technology that includes new product co-development plans and a […]

Cognos officials said on Dec. 11 that they have drafted an integration road map for the Applix products that Cognos acquired in September and have rebranded the software to align with Cognos’ performance management vision. But with Cognos in turn being acquired by IBM, it’s unclear where the company’s performance management road map will ultimately […]

Larry Ellison has a giving heart this holiday season. In the Dec. 10 commencement of its online IPO auction, NetSuite, in which the Oracle CEO has a 60 percent ownership, revealed that Ellison will donate some of the proceeds from NetSuite’s stock sales to charities. NetSuite filed for an IPO in June and on Dec. […]

Arizona joined Washington, Vermont and New York on Dec. 6 in signing an agreement with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to enhance the security of its driver’s licenses in compliance with the impending Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative [WHTI]. A majority of additional states are rebelling against a closely related license overhaul mandate, The Real […]

NetSuite’s IPO dreams are coming to fruition—with a twist. NetSuite plans to begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange Dec. 21 under the symbol ‘N.’ But NetSuite, majority-owned by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, is taking a decidedly Google approach to selling its shares. When Google went public in 2004 with the hottest offering in […]

BOSTON—SAP is developing business user applications—a term coined in the 48 hours after head of development Shai Agassi resigned in March—as a fourth product group that will take its place alongside NetWeaver, SAP’s Business Suite and Business ByDesign. The little known category, however, is not clearly defined at SAP, even by company executives. During SAP’s […]

Oracle acquired a Dutch application performance management software vendor, Moniforce, it announced Dec. 6, and with it the ability to add tools that help application administrators better detect and resolve end user and application logic issues. Moniforce’s software works across IT landscapes—from the user applications to the middleware, database and the underlying infrastructure layers. The […]