Oracle on the prowl!

Here is what Oracle CFO had to say during the earnings conference yesterday ...

Oracle continues to look at other large, multi-billion dollar acquisitions as part of its bid to supplement its internal growth, Henley added.
Henley declined to name specific companies that Oracle has looked at as possible acquisition targets other than PeopleSoft, but said the company has a list of some "half a dozen names" to consider "assuming we can work out a deal or two."

Here is my list:

• Veritas: this is one way for Oracle to get deeper into storage management. After having used (indirectly) Veritas, i can tell you that once a customer sets it up, it is close to impossible to get rid of it :-). Talk abt a captive/helpless customer base.
  The stock has been hit due to earnings restatements and an exec who lied in his resume! The stock is still a great buy; i own a few and am still adding.
  
• BEA : Larry Ellison has publicly indicated that he wants to acquire BEA if the price is right. Given the overlap between BEA's offering and Oracle's JDeveloper/Server products, paying a big premium doesn't make biz sense anyway.
  Meanwhile the BEA products (8.1, most recent) get better with every release. I installed/developed on it recently and it was not a bad experience. I own a few. It is very attractive right now since the stock got wallopped after their disappointing quarter.
  
• Mobius : After EMC acquired Documentum, it became obvious that Oracle would enter the document management space. Mobius is a likely candidate and looks cheap. I own a few; again, decently priced.
  
• Vignette, Stellent: More document mgmt companies. Not cheap. I own a good number of Vignette and a few Stellent.
  
• Lawson Software: This is one company that is getting lot of free publicity during the anti-trust trial. If the Peoplesoft bid does not go through, Oracle may settle for this. I own some small number of shares.
  
• Tibco, Opsware : Somewhat far fetched, but still a possibility. Messaging and data center management will remain money-making sectors for a while. I own a few of both.
  
• Business Objects, Cognos, ILog: again, a distant possibility. Though Oracle may not be mighty interested, these remain targets. I own some BOBJ and Cognos, and plan to keep adding.
  
• SeeBeyond, Cerner, Eclipsys, Siebel : SeeBeyond has a Oracle connection (Ray Lane). It has also been rumored that Oracle was interested in Cerner in the past, and Oracle acquired a very small startup in that area last year. I own a few of all the 4. I sold most of my SeeBeyond and Cerner shares long time ago making decent short-term gains, but kept a few.