Judge dismisses Oracle's fraud claim against HP

HP has won the latest round in its bitter lawsuit with database giant Oracle over its withdrawal of support for the Itanium processors.

A Californian judge dismissed claims of fraud that Oracle brought against HP.

Oracle and HP had originally reached a settlement to resolve litigation between the two firms over former HP chief executive Mark Hurd's appointment at Oracle.

But Oracle argued in court that it would never have reached that settlement had HP been up front about its plans to install former SAP chief executive, Léo Apotheker and former Oracle president Ray Lane to senior positions within the firm.

Both Lane and Apotheker have a long history of enmity with Oracle.

In an order made public on Monday, Judge James Kleinberg said: “The alleged fraud did not prevent Oracle from participating in the negotiations or deprive Oracle of the opportunity to negotiate.”

In a statement, HP it was “pleased” with the ruling.

“We look forward to seeing the facts made public that demonstrate how Oracle's March 2011 announcement to no longer develop software for Itanium servers was part of a calculated business strategy to drive hardware sales from Itanium to inferior Sun servers,” the firm said.

The fraud case is just one strand of many legal battles between the firms, which all link back to Oracle's decision to cease developing database middleware and application software that runs on Itanium processors. Oracle has always insisted its decision was based on the likelihood that Intel would end its Itanium development to focus on its x86 architecture.

Elsewhere, the Wall Street Journal has reported that HP paid Intel nearly £700m to keep developing Itanium. The revelation came from unsealed court papers relating to HP's on-going battle with Oracle.

“We look forward to seeing all of the facts made public that demonstrate how HP has known for years that Itanium is end of life,” Oracle said in a statement.