Oracle's Hurd Mentality

Updated with Hewlett-Packard's court action to block Mark Hurd's path to Oracle.

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Oracle's(ORCL) got its man: Mark V. Hurd, the ethics-tainted, staff slasher who was recently drummed out of Hewlett-Packard(HPQ).

And here's the good part -- Wall Street could hardly be happier.

Oracle shares shot up 6% Tuesday on news that CEO Larry Ellison found a place for his friend Hurd in the organization.

HP, however isn't pleased that its former chief has gone over to a top competitor. HP has filed a lawsuit in a California court charging that the move to Oracle violates the confidentiality terms of his exit agreement, according the The Wall Street Journal.

'Please go away, but don't go to Oracle with our trade secrets,' HP attempts to say in its lawsuit.

Oracle taps HP's former CEO, Mark Hurd

Investors liked the Oracle move Tuesday, clearly sensing that Hurd could bring a sharp ax to prune employees as Oracle continues its acquisitive style.

Hurd honed his firing skills -- or earned his chops, as you could say -- during his half decade running HP. Hurd cut the staff by 17,000 employees, or 5.2%, between October 2008 and October 2009. Many of those cuts came in the aftermath of HP's $13.9 billion acquisition of EDS.

Hurd's across-the-board cutting policy put him at odds with HP employees and the Silicon Valley technology community who felt HP's profit push was short sighted and a death knell for the vaunted research and development organization.

But Hurd's hard-charging bottom line discipline didn't cost him any points among investors. While computer sector peers like Dell(DELL), Microsoft(MSFT) and Intel(INTC) slumped, HP rose nearly 90% during Hurd's five-year run.

Never mind that Hurd abruptly left HP with a $12.2 million severance deal on August 6 after the board's internal investigation found that the CEO had violated the company's trust and ethics policies. Hurd reportedly settled a sexual harassment lawsuit brought by a female contractor. And the HP board reportedly decided that the negative fallout surrounding Hurd's so-called scandal would tarnish the company.

Fittingly, Hurd replaces Charles Phillips, an Oracle executive whose own private life became public after his jilted mistress launched a billboard campaign to expose their affair.

The upshot: Oracle and Hurd are a perfect pairing. Even Wall Street can see they deserve each other.

--Written by Scott Moritz in New York.

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