Oracle buys Sun

Oracle announced today they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Oracle will acquire Sun at $9.50 a share in cash. The deal has been unanimously approved by Sun's board, but still needs to be approved by Sun's shareholders and financial regulators, the companies said.

"Oracle will be the only company that can engineer an integrated system — applications to disk — where all the pieces fit and work together so customers do not have to do it themselves", said Larry Ellison.

The deal means Oracle will be taking over the Java language and software, which underpins Oracle Fusion Middleware. Also Oracle picks up the Solaris operating system, described by the companies as the leading platform for Oracle's database products. However Oracle is as committed as ever to Linux and other open platforms, the company said.