SAP may make Retek 'less friendly' to Oracle

The database software giant, which just completed a US$10 billion acquisition of PeopleSoft in January, is muscling in on SAP's bid to buy software maker Retek, by beating its rival's US$8.50 per share offer with a US$9 bid on Wednesday in the US.

In Sydney on Wednesday, Oracle's chairman Jeff Henley said the company has been in talks with Retek regarding the acquisition for some time. However, he said he was hoping Retek's board would not be in such a hurry to sell the company.

"We have been talking to Retek since the fall. We have partnered with them for years and they use our technology. The board made the decision to sell the company and they were talking to us and SAP. We were hoping they would wait till the summer -- to give us time to absorb Peoplesoft," said Henley.

Henley also said he fears that should Retek fall into SAP's hands, the company will rewrite the software to make less palatable to Oracle customers.

"In retail we don't have a merchandising product so we have had to partner with Retek. In a perfect world we would own Retek and make sure everything is fully integrated with the two.

If [SAP] prevail they are still going to have to make their Retek product work on Oracle technology so it isn't a total loss. But they may be inclined to rewrite it and we would not like that because it would make the product less friendly to Oracle. It is not an all or nothing proposition but Retek falling into SAP's hands is not something we want to see," said Henley.