Highlights
The largest enterprise software company in the United States.
Oracle's headquarters campus includes cafeterias, a gymnasium, and a company store.
Run by Larry Ellison, who is as notorious for his ego as his business acumen.
Has made several large acquisations in recent years: PeopleSoft, Siebel Systems, Hyperion Solutions, and BEA Systems (the latter for a reported $8.5 billion).
Virtually synonymous with database technology, Oracle is, second only to Microsoft among software makers. In the software world, the word “enterprise” in enterprise software refers to large organizations, and the number of large organizations that use Oracle's software is staggering: More than 98 of the companies in the Fortune 100 are Oracle clients. Not satisfied with its database domination, Oracle has long wanted to gain ascendancy in the comparatively glamorous world of business process applications. When its own efforts met with limited success, Oracle launched a 2003 bid to buy PeopleSoft, a business process application company best know for its HR software. But PeopleSoft didn't want to be bought, and a protracted takeover battle ensued. In the end, Oracle bought PeopleSoft for $10.3 billion in January of 2005. Oracle promptly laid off 5,000 of its 11,000 new employees.
The company continued targeting potential mergers to expand its product line, purchasing Siebel Systems and Hyperion Solutions in 2007. In 2008, the company continued the pattern by acquiring BEA Systems for approximately $8.5 billion.
With its enhanced new product line, the company hopes unprecedented profits are just around the corner. But some analysts wonder whether Oracle paid too much. On the database front, Oracle's latest technologies are designed for grid computing, which basically allows a number of computers and servers to share computing capacity. The grid computing database software is helping to drive new revenue for Oracle.