Nov 16 SaaS Newswire via (Reuters Legal) – SAP AG should have to pay Oracle Corp no more than $40.6 million to resolve their years-long lawsuit over software theft, an SAP damages expert said on Tuesday.
Stephen Clarke, SAP’s expert, said in court on Tuesday that damages must be the product of a reasonable business calculation, not an emotional reaction to the theft.
“There’s no anger allowed. There’s no punishment allowed,” Clarke said.
SAP and Oracle, which dominate the global market for software that helps businesses run more efficiently, are battling in court to determine the amount of damages for software theft by SAP.
SAP has accepted liability for its TomorrowNow subsidiary having wrongfully downloaded millions of Oracle files.
Last week, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said his company would have charged SAP $4 billion to license the programs that were wrongfully downloaded. Oracle’s own expert later pegged damages at $1.6 billion.
Oracle’s claims include copyright infringement, violations of California and federal computer fraud acts, breach of contract and intentional interference with the company’s business interests.
Out of 853 customers SAP was able to woo from Oracle, 561 of them never did any business with TomorrowNow, Clarke said.
Clarke also acknowledged that SAP has paid his own firm about $14 million in fees. Oracle’s damages expert testified last week that he had earned fees of about $4 million.
SAP is expected to rest its case after Clarke is finished testifying this week, at which point Oracle may attempt to put on a rebuttal case.
The case is Oracle USA Inc et al v. SAP AG et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 4:07-CV-1658. Oracle is represented by the San Francisco office of Bingham McCutchen and the Armonk, New York, and Oakland, California, offices of Boies, Schiller & Flexner. SAP is represented by the San Francisco, New York, Palo Alto and Houston offices of Jones Day.
(Reporting by Dan Levine of Reuters; Additional reporting by Terry Baynes of Reuters Legal)
Pulled from/Sourced: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AG0CO20101117
Tags: oracle, SaaS, SAP, software theft
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