Oracle to acquire insurance software company Skywire Software

Boston: Oracle Corp has announced that it has agreed to acquire the software business of the privately-held Frisco, Texas-based document management solutions vendor Skywire Software. Skywire was started up and owned by the Hall Financial Group.

Skywire Software LLC provides document management software primarily for the insurance industry. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2008.

According to information on the Skywire website, it was purchased for an undisclosed sum and does not include Skywire's iWave IT automation software, or its business process outsourcing unit. Skywire was founded in 2000, and has expanded and purchased 10 other businesses. The company has a staff strength 630 people, a third of them in the Dallas area.

Hall Financial is a Frisco, Texas based real estate development and management company and owns several vineyards in Napa Valley. The company was started by Craig Hall, formerly a part-owner of the Dallas Cowboys, who runs it along with his wife Kathryn Walt Hall.

Analysts say that Oracle is signalling that it wants to leverage its already strong share of insurers' database, financial and HR infrastructures as a springboard to becoming a one-stop shop for insurers' core processing IT application needs. They also predict that Oracle's push into insurance will kick off a wave of consolidation and countermeasures from its competitors such as SAP. The insurance software market is estimated to be worth between $2 billion and $4 billion.

Once the acquisition is complete, Skywire Software will add to Oracle's offerings in customer communication management and document automation capabilities across multiple industries including financial services, legal and utilities. Skywire has 1,450 insurance industry customers, Oracle said, while Oracle has over 1,000.

For Oracle, the Skywire acquisition complements another recent acquisition, that of AdminServer, a company which makes policy life-cycle management software for the insurance industry. "Insurance is a strategic industry for Oracle, with growth focused on integrated packaged applications," Oracle president Charles Phillips said in a statement, adding that "Insurance applications such as Skywire Software's for insurance policy life-cycle management help insurers navigate an increasingly complex business environment."