Hit #150 (Hyperion)

Hyperion (HYSL), after years of being rumored to be a target for one buyer or the other, is being bought, by Oracle. The cash offer of $3.3 billion translates into $52/share, a gain of 138.5% over my split-adjusted average cost of $21.8.

I had mentioned Business Objects (BOBJ) as the next top target for Oracle. I was wrong on that count.

This is a good buy for Oracle, and will hurt SAP given the latter's close partnership with Hyperion. SAP itself may go after Business Objects (BOBJ), while IBM probably will like Cognos (COGN).

Oracle's buying spree, noted in some of my posts, is hopefully coming to an end. Oracle needs some time to digest the pieces. The spree has already led to Oracle's shares being consistently ignored and undervalued as some of the cost-cutting/productivity promised has not materialized. Investors with a longer-term outlook should be buyers at this point, since I believe ultimately Oracle would have come out far ahead, thanks to these acquisitions.

On the lower end, Oracle will likely have to give away its database for free, but the resulting revenue loss should be made up by selling newer higher-level bundles.

So, who will it be next for Oracle ? I had made a list of possible candidates in two posts - here and here. I would assume that BEA (BEAS), Lawson (LWSN) and Informatica (INFA) are the ones on the top of the list.

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