SAP and Oracle fail to agree in court

SAP is to close TomorrowNow by the end of October

SAP and Oracle have failed to reach an agreement in court in the increasingly acrimonious dispute over TomorrowNow, a company SAP acquired from Oracle in 2005.

The court will now follow up proceedings (PDF) in a telephone conference with both parties on 20 October 2008.

The lack of agreement in the private case, in which no details can be disclosed, follows Oracle's extension of the lawsuit against SAP in July this year in which it added further claims of unlawful behaviour.

TomorrowNow provides cut-price software support for users of enterprise applications such as PeopleSoft, JD Edwards and Siebel. The firm was acquired by SAP in February 2005 with a view to tempting customers away from Oracle's acquisitions.

But the deal turned sour when Oracle accused TomorrowNow of "corporate theft on a grand scale".

Oracle had alleged that TomorrowNow's staff had stolen software and technical support materials, and launched legal proceedings against SAP seeking significant damages.

The company later filed an amendment to those complaints, after being given access to some of SAP's internal records.

Oracle further alleged that TomorrowNow had implemented a systematic programme to steal vital technical information.

This included establishing a centre dedicated to downloading Oracle's technical information, along with a customised software tool called Titan that was programmed to bypass customer log-in restrictions.

SAP is to close its controversial subsidiary TomorrowNow by the end of October. In the meantime customers will be helped to move to new support providers, including arch-rival Oracle.