Before Oracle spent $7.4 billion to buy Sun Microsystems in 2009, Oracle first asked HP to help it buy and divide Sun, reports PC World.
That's what HP's Ann Livermore said in her testimony in the HP v. Oracle trial. She remembers that Oracle approached HP and asked it to partner up to buy Sun with HP getting Sun's hardware business and Oracle getting Sun's software business, including assets like MySQL and Java.
What that means is that Oracle never really wanted Sun's hardware. That makes a lot of sense given that some top Oracle sales execs were caught slamming Sun hardware, saying "We bought a dog," according to instant messages submitted as evidence in the trial.
Larry Ellison has very publicly disagreed, claiming that, "Sun has been, by far, our most profitable acquisition. Sun's already paid for itself."
Ellison even says that Sun's hardware makes Oracle the Apple of the data center.
We're not sure we agree. We've heard from Oracle insiders that say Oracle can't get its act together with hardware.
Don't miss: The 10 Most Outrageously Entertaining Things Larry Ellison Just Said
Are you an Oracle employee or ex-employee with insight about Oracle to share? We want to hear it! We are discreet. jbort@businessinsider.com.
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