Oracle is to lay off 5 000 of its 55 000 employees in the wake of its merger with PeopleSoft, but how many of those are South African is unclear.
Internationally, notifications at both Oracle and newly acquired PeopleSoft began on Friday and the group said most would be completed over the subsequent 10 days.
Oracle SA spokesman Peter Heydenrych says she cannot comment further on how South African staff are affected.
All that Oracle SA is permitted to say is: "Further to this global announcement all employees in EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) of both Oracle and PeopleSoft have been reaffirmed that actions will be conducted in accordance with the applicable South African legislative requirements."
Although Oracle`s California-based head office declines to say how many of those being retrenched are PeopleSoft employees and how many are from Oracle, it does say it plans to retain more than 90% of PeopleSoft product development and product support staff.
"The PeopleSoft development team will finish the development and deployment of PeopleSoft version 8.9 and then begin development of the next upgrade to PeopleSoft products, version 9.0," the group says.
"The PeopleSoft support teams, with the assistance of the Oracle support organisation, will continue to support PeopleSoft customers around the world."
Oracle says it will present more detailed information this week about its applications organisation, product plans and go-to-market strategies.
Throughout the 18-month battle for ownership of PeopleSoft, Oracle maintained it would continue to support PeopleSoft products.
"By retaining the vast majority of PeopleSoft technical staff, Oracle will have the resources to deliver on the development and support commitments we have made to PeopleSoft customers over the past 18 months," says Oracle CEO Larry Ellison.
The merged entity is to be launched during a Webcast tomorrow. ITWeb will carry regular news updates from our correspondent at the event in San Francisco tomorrow and on Wednesday.
Reuters quotes Fulcrum Global Partners Clark Chang as saying the PeopleSoft acquisition gives Oracle the heft to compete against SAP, its European rival in business planning software, but also presents technical challenges as the company works to create a combined Oracle-PeopleSoft software package.
"The real revenue synergy of this acquisition happens when the combined version comes out in about three years from now," Chang says.
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