Oracle blasts EU concerns on Sun deal

SAN FRANCISCO, USA: Database giant Oracle Corp Monday blasted EU objections to the company's $7.4 billion takeover of Sun Microsystems Inc, saying it displayed a "profound misunderstanding" of the market by EU regulators.

Sun revealed the antitrust objection in a regulatory filing in the US, saying that the European Commission objected to the "combination of Sun's open source MySQL database product with Oracle's enterprise database products and its potential negative effects on competition in the market for database products".

The objections increase the likelihood that the European Union would oppose the merger in its official ruling due out by mid-January.

US antitrust regulators have already approved the deal, and Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison said the delay in gaining EU approval was costing Sun $100 million a month in losses.

The company also rejected the basis of the EU's argument that the takeover would limit competition on the database market.

"The commission's statement of objections reveals a profound misunderstanding of both database competition and open-source dynamics," Oracle said in a press release.

©IANS