[Info-vax] HP wins Oracle Itanium case

[Keith Parris]

On 8/3/2012 12:00 PM, JF Mezei wrote:
> Keith Parris wrote:
>
>> Any 2007 contract would not be involved here.
>
> Yes it would. The Hurd document simply re-affirms the 2007 contract
> isn't cancelled as Oracle had threatened to do if HP continued with its
> lawsuit.
>
> Here is how it went:

<speculation snipped>

The preliminary judgment at 
http://www.scefiling.org/filingdocs/194/53309/endorse_85234_111CV203163_PSOD.pdf 
tells us, based on the court testimony and exhibits:

3:16 "For approximately three decades Oracle ported its database, 
middleware, and key application software to HP's server platforms."
3:22 "The relationship was profitable for both parties."
4:1 "In April 2009, Oracle announced that it would acquire Sun Microsystems"
4:6 "HP was concerned whether Oracle would continue to offer its 
software on HP's hardware platforms now that Oracle would be competing 
with HP in the server market."
4:18 "[Oracle's most-senior software executive Thomas] Kurian told [HP's 
Dave] Donatelli that Oracle remained committed to the HP-Oracle 
partnership, and that new versions of Oracle software would continue to 
be released on HP-UX/Itanium at substantially the same time as on 
Oracle's Solaris/Sparc and IBM's AIX/Power platforms (a practice known 
as "release parity"). Kurian also told HP that its HP-UX/Itanium 
platforms would continue to enjoy functional parity. Neither release 
parity nor functional parity is possible if new versions of a software 
program are not offered on a given platform."
5:24 "Oracle specifically told HP in September 2010 that it intended to 
continue to offer new product releases on HP-UX/Itanium, and that HP 
would continue to have release parity with IBM and Sun."
6:5 "on September 6, 2010, Oracle announced that Hurd would be joining 
Oracle as its Co-President"
6:9 "The next day, September 7, HP initiated a lawsuit against Hurd in 
an effort to protect its trade secrets."
10:9 "The Settlement Agreement was executed by the parties on September 
20, 2010 (hereinafter referred to as the "Agreement"). Paragraph 1 of 
the Agreement provides:
_Reaffirmation of the Oracle-HP Partnership._ Oracle and HP reaffirm 
their commitment to their longstanding strategic relationship and their 
mutual desire to continue to support their mutual customers. Oracle will 
continue to offer its product suite on HP platforms, and HP will 
continue to support Oracle products (including Oracle Enterprise Linux 
and Oracle VM) on its hardware in a manner consistent with that 
partnership as it existed prior to Oracle's hiring of Hurd."
11:15 "As of September 2010, Oracle and HP had maintained a strategic, 
global partnership for thirty years and had thousands of joint 
customers. The partnership involved product development and porting 
work, and joint sales and support activities. The porting of Oracle 
products to HP platforms was foundational to the relationship."
12:15 "Once one of these major [Oracle] products was ported to Itanium, 
then all future releases of the same product were consistently ported to 
Itanium, and this practice continued without exception through September 
2010."
12:22 "The parties are in accord that over 99% of all porting to the 
HP-UX/Itanium was done without any written contracts."
12:26 "In the few instances where porting contracts were entered, the 
contract covered an initial port to HP-UX/Itanium of a product that had 
not previously been ported to the platforms. Subsequent versions of the 
product were ported to Itanium without further contracts."
13:7 "Ordinarily, HP has not paid Oracle to port its products to HP's 
platforms. In the handful of cases where HP did pay for an initial port, 
the payments were made to offset Oracle's out-of-pocket costs for the 
porting work. The course of conduct was that HP would provide servers to 
Oracle to be used in the porting process, where necessary. The parties 
each contributed their software personnel in order to effectuate the 
porting process."
13:15 "Oracle's course of conduct prior to its hiring of Hurd was to 
continue supporting a particular HP server line even after HP stopped 
selling that line. ... HP stopped selling PA-RISC servers in December 
2008. Oracle continued to port new products to PA-RISC for years after 
HP stopped selling the servers. Likewise, Oracle continued to port new 
products to Alpha after HP stopped selling Alpha servers in 2007. In the 
past Oracle never discontinued all software development for ANY 
microprocessor architecture while servers based on that architecture 
were still being sold to customers."
14:6 "Following the execution of the Agreement, the parties continued to 
engage in product development and porting work."
15:6 "In the period following the execution of the Agreement, Oracle 
undertook actions, including the doubling of the core factor used to set 
the price for Oracle software running on HP-UX/Itanium that strained the 
relationship. However, both companies' witnesses testified that the core 
partnership between the two companies, including the joint certification 
and porting work, continued throughout this period and up until the time 
of Oracle's March 2011 announcement."