Oracle Shakes Up Software

Whether it succeeds or not, Oracle's (ORCL Quote) unsolicited $5.1 billion attempted buyout of PeopleSoft (PSFT Quote) is shaking up the software industry and may well give even more impetus to a gathering M&A wave.

In the short run, the bid floated a number of software boats on Friday, including those of competitors SAP(SAP Quote) and Siebel Systems(SEBL Quote). SAP, the leading supplier of software to manufacturers, added $1.32, or 4.5% to $30.72. Siebel, the troubled developer of customer relationship-management software, was up 10% at one point, but slipped and closed the day up just 19 cents, or 1.7% to $10.98.

Why is SAP suddenly looking even better than usual? That's because Oracle said that if its bid is successful, it will not continue to develop new PeopleSoft applications or integrate the two product lines. And that could mean a lot of angry and confused customers thinking about whom they really want to buy sofware from. ...