Oracle is known for being aggressive during the sales cycle and dismissive of any issues or concerns arising during implementation. Oracle’s in-house legal department is often unreasonable and unwilling to compromise.

• I’ve litigated against Oracle, negotiated with Oracle, and mediated disputes with Oracle throughout my career.
• Make no mistake: Oracle is difficult to deal with. Their salespeople are aggressive, their lawyers are difficult to deal with, and they rarely make meaningful concessions.
• It’s a culture that starts at the top.

If you are considering suing Oracle for a failed digital transformation or ERP failure, make sure you know what you are getting into and have counsel who has been there before.

You must have a good case before you sue any ERP software vendor, especially Oracle. What does that mean?

• The reason you are suing – cannot be based on a subjective determination that the software does not work.
• Litigating because the software does not work how you expected it to or is not as efficient as your legacy system is insufficient.
• An objective, measurable, and substantive deviation from the software’s documentation or the vendor’s warranty obligations must exist.
• If the vendor misrepresented the software functionality, your reliance on those misrepresentations must have been reasonable, and the misrepresentation must have been based on a present material fact—not future intent.

While I think you should do everything you can to salvage a failing project, Oracle may be unwilling to meet you halfway. If that is the case, you may have no choice but to litigate.