enterprise

Oracle reorganizes, and Wookey walks

Oracle has been known to play musical chairs with its executives and retool its operations with a jack hammer.

And in this latest go-around, the enterprise applications software giant is cutting loose John Wookey, Oracle's senior vice president of applications development, who handled its Fusion efforts, according to Dennis Howlett, who runs Irregular Enterprise, a blog on ZDNet.

Wookey, when reached at his home Monday night by CNET's News.com, declined to comment on his status. A spokesman for Oracle said Tuesday morning the company does not usually comment on executive changes.

Howlett, citing an e-mail sent throughout … Read more

Google Enterprise Search gets social

Google's Enterprise Search Appliance customers are being notified of a free upgrade that's now available. It adds new features to the buttoned-down, behind-the-firewall search appliance designed for giant companies and their IT departments.

But the product now has an unbuttoned, free-for-all aspect that admins can turn on, that allows end users to stuff search results into the engine for other users at their company. Called KeyMatch, this feature lets users create specific results for search terms. For example, a user could add a search result for "picnic" that points to an intranet page about the company … Read more

USS Enterprise will take your calls

Some phone and gadget makers have understandably sought to make handsets based on Star Trek communicators, but that approach is apparently too subtle for others. Why limit yourself to a single replica, after all, when you can do the whole ship?

The "Star Trek USS Enterprise Telephone" is exactly that, a limited edition that GeekAlerts says even bears the inscription of William Shatner himself. When a call comes in, a red alert sounds and the engines light up.

It's not a mobile phone, however, so your bragging rights will be confined to your own conn. But it … Read more

SAP plans to acquire Business Objects

SAP announced Sunday afternoon it plans to acquire Business Objects in a cash deal valued at slightly more than $6.8 billion.

The acquisition, which is expected to close in the first quarter of 2008, is SAP's largest acquisition ever. The deal is especially noteworthy for SAP, which has tended to favor developing its own technology rather than acquiring it.

The acquisition of Business Objects, a leading player in business intelligence software, is designed to dovetail into SAP's previously announced plans to double its addressable market by 2010, said Henning Kagermann, SAP chief executive, during a press conference … Read more

'Mr. Sulu' honored with his own asteroid

George Takei, the TV actor best known for his role as Mr. Sulu on the original Star Trek series, has had an asteroid named after him.

In the latest example of real scientists paying homage to science fiction, the International Astronomical Union last week honored the actor and his character, by renaming an asteroid, formerly known as 1994 GT9. The new name will be 7307 Takei, according to a story by the Associated Press.

Others involved with Star Trek who have had asteroids named after them are Gene Roddenberry, the series creator, and Nichelle Nichols, the actress who played Lt. … Read more

Daily dose of BEA? Icahn raises stake--again

Just yesterday, billionaire investor Carl Icahn pushed his stake in BEA Systems into the double digits to slightly more than 11 percent. And today, he's raising his stake in the company again. This time, Icahn's boosting it to 13.2 percent.

Based on BEA's proxy last year, Icahn's investment would make him and his affiliates the second largest stakeholders in the company, after FMR and its wholly owned subsidiary Fidelity Management & Research, which held a 14.1 percent stake last year.

Although Icahn's bigger stake increases the pressure on BEA to consider his proposal … Read more

iForem launches 'lifetime' storage service

iForem is a new service making its debut at the DemoFall conference. Currently aimed at enterprise users, the company is set to step into the consumer space early next year. The basic premise of iForem is that users pay for storage up front, similar to purchasing actual physical media to save their files. iForem then keeps the files safe, secure, and redundant as long as you've got the proper passwords--all without a subscription.

iForem creators Stephen Pieraldi and TJ de Luna started the company as a response to some of the free online storage solutions out there that offer … Read more

Icahn raises stake in BEA Systems

Carl Icahn has thrown another log on the fire he's lit under BEA Systems, raising his stake to 9.88 percent in the enterprise applications software maker.

The billionaire shareholder activist, who last week called for the company's sale and raised his stake to 8.5 percent, went on the offensive again Thursday by adding more BEA shares to his holdings.

Icahn and his related entities now own a total of 38.7 million shares. That's a pretty large match to wave around, as he tries to ignite movement on BEA's board to put a "… Read more

FBI looks to Java to streamline wiretap requests

The FBI is replacing the Microsoft Access software it uses to track National Security Letter (NSL) wiretap cases with a new, automated, database management system sporting a Java Enterprise Edition application server using Oracle software.

The agency wants to eliminate manual entry of "cumbersome and error-prone" data on its eavesdropping cases. The way it stands now, the databases are not even connected to each other. Instead, an employee must manually enter every NSL lead sent to the Office of General Counsel (OGC)--a process that could take up to a dozen fields including a 15-digit alphanumeric identifier. The … Read more