Analyst Casts Doubt On Rumored Salesforce Inc. Acquisition By Oracle Corp.

An acquisition of Salesforce.com Inc.

by Oracle Corp.

is an old and extremely unlikely rumor, an analyst told Benzinga Thursday. The unsourced rumor surfaced most recently via a StockTwits comment by the anonymous Open Outcrier. But Evercore ISI's Kirk Materne said in an interview that an acquisition of Salesforce.com by Oracle "would be complicated" and "seriously doubtful." Salesforce.com traded recently up nearly 2 percent at $68.97. Materne said speculation regarding a tie-up of the two companies has surfaced periodically for a decade. Salesforce chief executive Marc R. Benioff has had a number of past personal feuds with Oracle's chairman Lawrence J. Ellison. Oracle's Chief Executive Mark earlier on Thursday called Salesforce's current valuation "absurd." http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2015/04/23/oracle-ceo-hurd-salesforce-crm-boston-college.html "What are they worth right now? $35 billion? Who cares? It's absurd. But they're quote-unquote, ‘cool.'" Hurd said, according to a report by American Cities Business Journals. Also Thursday, Salesforce launched a new line of products tied to its human resources management services business segment. http://investor.salesforce.com/about-us/investor/investor-news/investor-news-details/2015/Salesforce-Introduces-Salesforce-for-HR--Transforming-Employee-Engagement-with-the-Platform-for-Employee-Success/default.aspx