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Oracle and HP to begin $3bn court battle over Itanium-powered systems

HP blames Oracle for causing sales collapse of Itanium-based systems

Jurors are set to hear opening arguments from Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Oracle today as the two technology giants continue their bitter legal battle.

HPE has accused Oracle of helping to slash sales of Itanium-based systems, which it makes alongside Intel, and it is seeking $3bn in damages from the software giant.

HPE alleges that Oracle, which was one of its key partners, helped Itanium-powered systems sales to plunge because its January 2010 purchase of Sun Microsystems essentially turned Oracle into an HP (now HPE) competitor.

But Oracle refutes HPE's allegation, arguing that other reasons were behind the fact that Itanium-based products didn't sell.

The animosity between the two companies reached a new peak when Oracle offered former HP CEO Mark Hurd a job as a co-president. HP's board had controversially asked him to resign the month before.

At the time, HP filed suit against Oracle, suggesting that Hurd possessed trade secrets that would allow Oracle to compete unfairly with his former employer. The companies reached a settlement several weeks later.

Oracle said in March 2011 that it would stop creating new versions of its database and other software for Itanium-based systems. It claimed that Intel, which worked with HP to create Itanium, had made clear that Itanium was nearing the end of its life.

Intel and HP hit back, stating that they remained committed to Itanium. HP sued Oracle in June 2011, stating that as part of the settlement it had reached in 2011, it should have kept supporting Itanium as it had been.

HP claimed that Oracle instead "exhorted its salesforce to strike at HP's base of Itanium customers to try to switch them to Oracle's Sun platform".

A judge ruled in favour of HP in August 2012, saying that the 2010 settlement had obliged Oracle to keep developing Itanium versions of its products for free as long as HP sold such systems.

The current case will look at whether either company violated the agreement and any damages that are owed as a result. The trial is expected to last about five weeks.

Google beat Oracle last week in a court case over the use of 37 Java APIs in the Android operating system.

Oracle and HP to begin $3bn court battle over Itanium-powered systems

HP blames Oracle for causing sales collapse of Itanium-based systems

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