Oracle Accuses HP of Paying Intel to Keep Itanium on Life Support

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All Things Digital Got its hands on a document filed by Oracle against HP in an ongoing argument over Oracle's decision not to support Intel's Itanium processor anymore.

In this filing, Oracle claims that Intel's Itanium processor is virtually dead and only on artificial life support as HP is paying Intel a substantial amount of money to support the perception that the Itanium processor is an actively developed product.

In its filing, Oracle alleges that HP's interest in the survival of Itanium are service contracts for HP-UX that is running on Itanium systems. Losing Oracle as a software vendor that is delivering software for Itanium could contribute to customer decisions to migrate to different platforms. "This is a multi-billion dollar problem for HP," the document states. What makes this claim especially interesting is the fact that Oracle's co-president, Mark Hurd, was HP's CEO until August 2010 and has detailed knowledge of HP's operations.

"These factors led HP to craft a top-secret plan to create a false perception that Itanium still had a future," Oracle states in the document published by All Things Digital. "HP understands that the future prospects of IT products drive customer purchasing decisions. A buyer who knew that Intel saw no future for Itanium, and was only continuing to invest in the line pursuant to a contractual obligation, would devalue the future prospects of Itanium servers and be less inclined to buy."

HP, however, continues to claim that Oracle's move to drop Itanium support was solely designed to force its customers into buying Sun servers. "This filing is just the latest in its ongoing campaign to shore up its failing Sun server business and starve thousands of existing Itanium customers who rely on their Itanium processors for mission-critical activities." HP said. "As Oracle well knows, HP and Intel have a contractual commitment to continue to sell mission-critical Itanium processers to our customers through the next two generations of microprocessors, thus ensuring the availability of Itanium through at least the end of the decade. HP is resolved to enforcing Oracle’s commitments to HP and our shared customers and will continue to take actions to protect its customers’ best interests. It is time for Oracle to quit pursuing baseless accusations and honor its commitments to HP and to our shared customers in a timely manner."

Intel declined to comment on the allegations.

Wolfgang Gruener
48 Comments Comment from the forums
  • sinfulpotato
    Wasn't it obvious that the towel was thrown in when AMD made x86-64 back in the early 2000's?
    Reply
  • de5_Roy
    nice one intel! your evilness wins again.
    still, hpintel's itanium-of-evil plan is only successful since oracle got tricked into thinking itanium has a future. it's partly oracle's fault for being foolish. they woudn't have realized unless that ex-hp dude was oracle's vp.
    only if amd was smart like this. they'd be able to keep a dud cpu like zambezi alive for years. >:D
    Reply
  • tului
    @sinfulpotato I think they threw the towel in for the desktop back then but kept on trying to make it succeed in the server space for a bit longer. I'm really hoping between Sparc and ARM they put massive pressure on Intel and really drive out some innovation in the next 20 years or so.
    Reply
  • turbotong
    Wow, this is going to get tricky real fast. Especially if Mark Hurd is involved. I'm pretty sure some part of his previous settlement with HP involved not giving away company secrets like that (if true).
    Reply
  • lenell86
    ^^ Christ, a bunch of illiterate users that probably have never played with a server, commenting on an article for itanium servers...all of you users that commented should stay out of articles like these and stick to "AMD PHENOM IS BETTER THAN BULLDOZER ZOMG" consumer articles. Don't infest your idiocracy to the more advanced articles, let the pros comment on these, ok? JESUS
    Reply
  • sinfulpotato
    Considering the moment the Opteron was released IA-64 never stood a chance. The game was already over, Intel was forced to use x86-64 with the Xeon.
    Reply
  • robwright
    The best part is, Oracle accused HP of pulling a "Weekend At Bernie's" with Itanium in its court filings. True story.
    Reply
  • hetneo
    lenell86^^ Christ, a bunch of illiterate users that probably have never played with a server, commenting on an article for itanium servers...all of you users that commented should stay out of articles like these and stick to "AMD PHENOM IS BETTER THAN BULLDOZER ZOMG" consumer articles. Don't infest your idiocracy to the more advanced articles, let the pros comment on these, ok? JESUSDitto.
    Reply
  • bfstev
    Im not sure mark hurd's non-compete/ non-disclosure agreement with HP bares him from revealing CRIMINAL activity such as the fraud they are accusing them of. While it may give them grounds to sue, they arent going to want the justice department getting ahold of the documents used in discovery if they did do this.
    Reply
  • campb292
    HP allegedly pays Intel to keep Itanium alive. So, what? Oracle has had a nice steady climb in value since the early 2000's. Perhaps they are feeling their valuation is overstated and need to seek court help to put down the better competition?
    Reply