Oracle Acquires Larry Ellison-Backed Storage Company Pillar Data Systems
Oracle this morning announced that it has agreed to buy Pillar Data Systems, a privately-held provider of SAN Block I/O storage systems based in San Jose, California, which is said to serve nearly 600 customers across 24 countries.
Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
An interesting purchase, particularly since Pillar Data Systems is majority-owned by Oracle founder and CEO Larry Ellison through his venture capital firm Tako Ventures. According to a 2005 CRN article, Ellison invested over $150 million in the business.
It’s worth nothing that Oracle claims the evaluation and negotiation of the transaction was led by an independent committee of Oracle’s board of directors.
Also, the transaction is structured as a 100 percent earn-out with no up-front payment.
The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in July 2011, exactly a decade after Pillar Data Systems was founded.
On a sidenote: kudos to Michael Romley, who predicted this transaction would (or should) occur back in September 2010.
Interesting deal to say the least
Larry gets his 544 MILLION dollars back, plus interest.
Oracle gets to fill in the SAN hole (no longer relabel other peoples SAN equipment)
Pillar team gets an earn out over three years of the actual profit (you know, something they havent been able to do after spending 544 million of Larrys money)
Earn Out = Net Profit x 3
Sounds like Larry is the real winner in all of this for sure.
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