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????給Autonomy首席執行官麥克?林奇的一些建議：你盡可以在私人談話中混淆是非。但如果你留下了幻燈片，所以要么和盤托出，要么三緘其口。 ????Autonomy是一家英國企業軟件供應商，惠普（HP）此前同意以103億美元將其收購。不過在隨后的一次營收電話會議上，甲骨文（Oracle）首席執行官拉里?埃里森表示：“Autonomy曾向我們兜售過自己……我們評估了報價，認為高得離譜?！?/p> ????讓我們先看看第二部分。價格當然高得離譜。相比Autonomy在倫敦交易所的交易價格，溢價高達80%。事實上，當惠普新任首席執行官梅格?惠特曼被問及她的前任是否出價過高時，她回應稱：“Autonomy物有所值?！?/p> ????不過，埃里森陳述的第一部分才是我寫作本篇文章的原因。Autonomy首席執行官麥克?林奇對《華爾街日報》（WSJ）稱，Autonomy向甲骨文自我兜售的說法“非常不準確……如果有某家銀行恰好將我們列為潛在收購目標，那也與我們毫無干系。” ????不過上周四，甲骨文決定反戈一擊。它發布了一份幻燈片，這是林奇在2011年4月一次會議上向甲骨文總裁馬克?赫德演示時使用的。以下鏈接是幻燈片的第一部分和第二部分。文件里的確能列出了一家銀行，不過這可不是隨隨便便的“某家銀行”。而是投資銀行Qatalyst Partners，Autonomy所聘請的收購顧問正是該銀行。而且，甲骨文還表示，Qatalyst的創始人弗蘭克?夸特隆也出席了4月份的會議。 ????現在皮球又踢給了麥克?林奇，不過我實在想不出除了認栽，林奇還會有什么別的辦法。也許他還能保持沉默，其實他一開始就應該這樣做。 ????最新消息1：Autonomy再次反駁。其主旨是指出，我之前所說的大錯特錯。Autonomy的聲明如下： ????2011年4月， 在弗蘭克?夸特隆的引薦下，Autonomy和馬克?赫德進行了一次大約三十到四十分鐘的會談。甲骨文是Autonomy的客戶。我們當時明確表示Autonomy并未尋求出售，也沒有展開任何出售行動。當時，夸特隆先生的公司還沒有受聘于Autonomy。從那以后，我們和甲骨文再沒有任何接觸。 ????投資銀行很有可能獨自向業界其它公司推銷Autonomy，這是很普遍的做法，不過這并非出自我們的要求。Qatalyst已經通知我們，甲骨文不久前在其網站上公布的幻燈片是Qatalyst準備的，后者在1月26日自行將其發送給甲骨文（幻燈片內容可以明顯看出是1月份制作的）。我們是第一次看到這些幻燈片。Autonomy與此事毫無關系，而Qatalyst也是直到今年年中才被Autonomy聘請。Autonomy并未在會議上展示這些幻燈片。 ????最新消息2：弗蘭克?夸特隆通過科技博客Alphaville發表聲明，對其客戶關于時間的說法表示支持。 ????“甲骨文公開展示的幻燈片是我在1月份時發給馬克?赫德的，是由Qatalyst準備的，用于我們獨自向甲骨文推介Autonomy。在4月份我們與馬克和道格的會面上，這些幻燈片并未被使用?！?/p> ????如果還有第三次更新的話，千萬不要吃驚。甲骨文很有可能進行反駁（短短幾個小時之內，它就從進攻者變成了防御者。） |
????Some advice for Autonomy CEO Mike Lynch: You can obfuscate about what is said in a private conversation. But if you also leave behind a slide-deck, it's best to either come clean or keep your mouth shut. ????Autonomy is the British enterprise software company that HP (HPQ) agreed to buy last month for $10.3 billion. In a subsequent earnings call, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said: "Autonomy was shopped to us... We looked at the price and thought it was absurdly high." ????Let's take the second part first. Of course it was absurdly high. An 80% premium to where Autonomy was trading in London! In fact, here is how newly-installed HP CEO Meg Whitman responded when asked if her predecessor overpaid: "It is what it is." ????The first part of Ellison's statement, however, is the reason for this post. Autonomy CEO Mike Lynch told WSJ that the idea of Autonomy shopping itself to Oracle (ORCL) was "inaccurate... If some bank happened to come with us on a list, that is nothing to do with us." ????Today Oracle laid down the boom, posting a slide-deck that Lynch gave to Oracle president Mark Hurd during an April 2011 meeting. Here is Part 1, and here is Part 2. You'll notice that a bank is listed on the deck, but it's not just "some bank." It's Qatalyst Partners, the shop retained by Autonomy. Moreover, Oracle says that Qatalyst founded Frank Quattrone was present at the April meeting. ????The ball is now in Mike Lynch's court, but I can't imagine what he can do at this point but fall on his sword. Or maybe just keep quiet, like he should have in the first place. ????Update: Well, Autonomy is fighting back again. And basically suggesting that statements like my lead graph are way off base. In a statement Autonomy says: ????In April 2011, there was a meeting for approximately thirty or forty minutes between Autonomy and Mark Hurd, which was set up by Frank Quattrone as an introduction to Mark Hurd. Oracle is an Autonomy customer. It was made clear that Autonomy was not for sale and no sale process was under way. Mr. Quattrone's company was not engaged by Autonomy at that time. There has been no other contact with Oracle since then. ????It may well be that investment banks were independently recommending Autonomy as an acquisition target to industry players – that is standard practice for — but this would not have been at our behest. Qatalyst have informed us that the slides Oracle has recently posted on its website were prepared and sent independently by Qatalyst to Oracle on 26 January (the content is clearly from January). This is the first time we have seen them. Autonomy was not involved in this nor was Qatalyst engaged by Autonomy until mid-year. Autonomy did not present these slides in the meeting. ????Update II: Frank Quattrone is backing the timeline of his client, via a statement to Alphaville: ????"The slides Oracle posted publicly were sent by me to Mark Hurd in January, were prepared by Qatalyst and were for the purpose of our independently pitching Autonomy as an idea to Oracle. These slides were not used in our April meeting with Mark and Doug." ????Don't be surprised if there is a third update, with some sort of rebuttal from Oracle (which has gone from offense to defense in a matter of hours).. |
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