Oracle-BEA split over new valuation

WAS IT OSCAR Wilde, Dr Johnson or one of those other quotable types who nailed the malleable nature of morality when a woman told him how appalled she was by prostitution? “Ah, but would you sleep with a good-looking gentleman for a million pounds if it were guaranteed that nobody would ever find out?” he asks. She pauses, embarrassed. “Then you’re exactly the same as the prostitute,” he says. “You’re just haggling about the price.” Or something like that.

Well, BEA similarly wants to have it both ways, blushingly rejecting the suitor while sending out not so subtle signals that it will do the deed so long as the price is jacked up a little.

Late yesterday UK time, BEA said $21 a share would get Oracle anything it wanted but, having scaled the moral high ground, Larry Ellison’s men say that’s a price too high.

An odd feature of this proposed deal is that it has been carried out via a series of letters, a bit like a software version of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. In the latest, Oracle president Charles Phillips calls BEA’s demands “impossibly high” and promises to ride out and conquer a different maiden if BEA won’t walk the walk.

So, here’s how it is. Oracle wants to pay $6.7bn but BEA is holding out for $8.3bn. The smart money is on the pair splitting the difference somewhere nearer Oracle’s first bid. But BEA should surely get this affair over with – sharpish. µ