SAP appeals for Oracle court gag

Enterprise software maker SAP has filed a motion in a Californian district court to prevent lawyers acting for Oracle from making “extrajudicial statements” until a copyright infringement battle between the two companies is over.

The move by SAP followed an October 8 blog in the New York Times by Joe Nocera, accusing SAP of “brazen theft of intellectual property” and suggesting that the newly-appointed HP chief and former SAP chief Leo Apotheker knew about it. 

SAP’s motion noted that the blog was written by the fiancee of the publicist for Oracle’s law firm in the case.

“As it turns out, and as the newspaper belatedly acknowledged, the author is the fiancée of the publicist for Boies, Schiller & Flexner, Oracle’s lead trial counsel in this case. 

“Although the author denies knowing that his fiancée’s law firm represents Oracle, he does not deny that she was the source of the detailed information and evidence he cites in his article.”

A week prior to the article, Oracle’s defence lawyers had raised concern that jurors would be influenced by media during the trial.

SAP in August conceded that subsidiary TomorrowNow, which it has since shut down, had infringed on Oracle’s copyright. TomorrowNow was alleged to have copied software fixes from Oracle’s website and used them to offer discounted services to Oracle customers. 

SAP has said it was now focused on limiting Oracle’s “vastly overstated” damages claim. 

The six week trial will commence on November 1.