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BY GRACE MEINERS

“Word of a settlement between Mark Hurd, the new co-president of Oracle, and his former employer, Hewlett-Packard. The lawsuit sought to stop Hurd from working at Oracle, fearing Hurd would share HP’s trade secrets.” (Forbes)

Mark Hurd will become co-president of Oracle after all, albeit tight-lipped and with lighter pockets. Some in the business world are praising the settlement for being mutually beneficial, others are saying HP is merely cutting its losses.

We’re analyzing coverage from Forbes, Bloomberg, ITNewsWire, and InformationWeek.

Back in August, Hurd resigned after allegations he falsified documents to cover an affair with a co-worker. Hurd then took a job at Oracle, but HP sued in September fearing Hurd would share HP’s trade secrets. On Bloomberg lawyer Murray Schwartz praised the two parties for turning the nasty litigation into something positive.

"This means that Mark Hurd is a free man, and that if he doesn’t disclose any secrets he learned at HP. 'That’s absolutely correct and it’s miraculous. Bless the ingenuity and good sense of the American businessman.'"

But many are saying once Hurd left HP, stock prices began to dip and the company decided to work it out with Oracle before their shares dropped any lower.

According to ITNewsWire, HP’s stock has dropped almost seven dollars a share since the day Mark Hurd was fired on August 6. Multiply that by the 2.27 billion shares, it means a 15.6 billion Hurd-related drop.

And Bloomberg goes on to say many competition laws would have made it almost impossible to keep Hurd out of the Oracle boardroom.

“In addition a lot of what they were seemingly trying to do, which is enforce clauses in laws related to intellectual property and non-compete opportunities for Mark Hurd, the reality is that these are difficult to enforce in this context in California. Ultimately we think that HP realized that perhaps at the least they could get back some of those Stock options.”

And InformationWeek says whether the settlement is miraculous or not, the two companies are singing a completely different tune than they were back in August.

“The rapprochement between the two tech giants is in stark contrast to the barbs they exchanged shortly after HP announced Sept. 7 it was suing its former chief. In a win for customers, the two companies also said they would continue to collaborate on a number of joint initiatives.”

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