Oracle may submit third PeopleSoft bid

Oracle chairman Larry Ellison has hinted that the company could yet again increase its offer for rival PeopleSoft.

Speaking at Oracle's AppsWorld conference in London today, Ellison said he believed that the current $6.3bn (£3.8bn) offer was "fully valued and fair".

But with PeopleSoft's board recommending that shareholders reject the offer, Ellison refused to rule out a higher bid. "Never say never," he said.

Oracle has steadfastly pursued PeopleSoft's enterprise application businesses, despite an increasingly hostile reaction from PeopleSoft's board of directors.

"They refuse to speak to us," Ellison told delegates at AppsWorld. "But we believe the decision should be made by the people that own the company: the shareholders."

Ellison was also keen to woo PeopleSoft's customers. He cited the 1994 acquisition of relational database RDB from Digital Equipment as an example of how Oracle had continued to support and develop products for its acquired customers.

"It makes no sense to have a goal of obtaining customers and then do things to upset them," he added.

The Oracle chief also used his address to promise improvements to Oracle's business software, claiming it would improve staff behaviour.

The salesman that spent the most on entertaining but sold the least would know about it, Ellison explained.

By keeping information in the fewest number of databases, business applications would be able to present accurate accounts of employee performance on a daily basis. Daily business updates would help employees do a better job, he said.

That salesman "should know you know", Ellison told delegates. "He'll then want to change his behaviour."