Oracle Corp. this morning said that BEA Systems Inc. has officially rejected its offer to acquire the company. BEA had previously said the offer was too low.
“Last night we were told by Bill Klein, vice president of business planning and development (speaking on behalf of the board), that BEA’s board again rejected our proposed price of $17 per share in cash,” Oracle said in a statement, adding that the BEA board “has refused to meet with us since we made our Oct. 9 proposal.”
Oracle set a deadline for Sunday at 5 p.m. local time on its $17 per share bid.
“Oracle has no interest in a long, drawn-out process to acquire BEA,” Oracle said.
The total value of the bid is about $6.7 billion.
The letter’s terse tone reflects the nature of the Oracle and BEA merger talks, which have been marked by dueling public statements and cancelled meetings. Oracle is well-used to grueling acquisition processes, however, such as when it bought PeopleSoft. But the company sent a clear signal that it is not interested in another long battle.
If it succeeds in buying BEA, Oracle would swallow up a major competitor in the application server space, a scenario that has had some observers wondering about the fate of BEA’s technologies.
Oracle’s move to purchase BEA is only the latest in a string of high-profile buys in 2007. The company has forked over billions for a wide array of enterprise software companies, including business process management vendor Hyperion Solutions and application data grid player Tangosol.