What a world we live in! What an alignment of the stars! Nostradamus could not have had a more insightful prediction 400 years ago. Mark Hurd gets ousted from HP because he has an “inappropriate” relationship with a contractor – sounds rather Clinton-like. HP general counsel said Hurd “demonstrated a profound lack of judgment that seriously undermined his credibility and damaged his effectiveness in leading HP.” I mean, really…what do you expect a lawyer to say! Larry Ellison thinks the HP board is inane
A while back Charles Phillips’ girlfriend put up a billboard in Times Square – a major embarrassment for Phillips, particularly since she picked Times Square – how touristy, pedestrian. Couldn’t she have picked the corner of Central Park South & 5th or 82nd & 5th? Then Phillips makes some tangential allusion to a $70 Billion acquisition budget, and the press calls it gospel. Next thing you know, Phillips is out, Hurd is in. This is like a Greek play – a modern day “deus ex machina”, with Ellison as “machina”.
Phillips did a super job of building Oracle up from a ton of acquisitions. This was a monumental feat and done brilliantly. Poor IBM and Microsoft – they can’t pull this stuff off. Now Hurd steps in to make it all work and really shore up Oracle’s hardware business – another kick in the IBM ass, as well as to HP.
The real irony is still to come – the day when Oracle acquires HP, Hurd fires the HP board, HP general counsel is relegated to mailroom duty, and Oracle then sets its sights squarely on IBM. The problem for IBM is that they’re big, but they’re not so tough. Oracle however is tough! They have proven they can and will continue to kick ass. Ellison is like the Clint Eastwood of Tech, but instead of a gun he packs cash and belligerence. This is the makeup of a winner – or a warrior.
So where does this leave HP (and IBM for that matter)? Well, I heard through the grapevine that Hurd told HP to put in place “Operation Nostradamus”, accompanied by the following revenue projection:
I hope to blog again.
