June 26th, 2007
Ellison: Oracle to continue acquisition spree
During the Q4 earnings call Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said that his company is not going to slow down its acquisitions binge. Oracle has acquired more than 30 companies in the last five years, including five in the last quarter, led by Hyperion for $3.3 billion. “I expect the pace to continue,” Ellison said.
More acquisitions is key to Oracle in reaching its goal of 50 percent margins and 20 per cent earnings annual growth. CFO Safra Katz said the company is “hitting on all cyclinders”:
The reality is high pipelines look fantastic frankly for Q1, going into Q1 it will be obviously exciting. It could be our largest Q1 ever, as you can see by our guidance, we feel that we are really going on all cylinders and the forecast is very, very, very significant. So, we feel very good about it. Well, we wouldn’t have come up with this kind of guidance, frankly.
As far as margins, you can see they continue to improve year-over-year. It’s really a matter of scale and as the acquisitions get to scale, they start to show very significant profitability. The reality is that, it really all depends on what we buy, but consistently I expect to see the same level of margin improvement, if not more, for the company next year.
Read the Oracle earnings call transcript (SeekingAlpha)
Dan Farber, editor-in-chief of CNET News.com, has more than 20 years of experience as an editor and journalist covering technology. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
