Mercury Interactive Corp

1. Mercury Interactive Corporation Address
2. Mercury Software

This is a securities class action against Mercury Interactive Corp. (“Mercury”), some of its former officers and directors, and its auditor. The action was settled early on, a settlement class was certified, the settlement was approved, and attorneys' fees were awarded per the settlement agreement.

Mercury Interactive Corporation Address

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) - Hewlett-Packard Co. Said late Tuesday it agreed to acquire Mercury Interactive Corp., a troubled maker of testing and optimization software, through a cash tender offer worth at least $4.5 billion. The deal valued Mercury Interactive at $52 a share, a 33% premium to its Tuesday closing price of $39, and sent its shares soaring in after-hours trading. The $4.5 billion figure is net of Mercury Interactive's cash, H-P said. H-P said the transaction, which also includes the assumption of an unspecified amount of Mercury Interactive debt, will cut earnings by 4 cents a share for the fiscal year ending in October, 2007, and add 2 cents a share the following fiscal year. Palo Alto, Calif.-based H-P said it would begin its tender offer 'promptly' and expects to close the deal in the fourth calendar quarter.

The acquisition is the boldest move yet for Hewlett-Packard Chief Executive Mark Hurd, who has cut thousands of jobs and reorganized the technology giant's operations since joining H-P in March 2005. Acquiring Mercury Interactive, which had sales of $843 million in 2005, will approximately double H-P's annual software revenue to more than $2 billion, company officials said on a conference call. Mercury Interactive's software makes it easier for corporations to integrate disparate software systems. George Hamilton, enterprise computing analyst with the research firm Yankee Group, called the acquisition a good move for H-P because its products already exist along with Mercury's in many corporate accounts. 'H-P is the management expert for infrastructure (and) Mercury has more expertise in application management,' Hamilton said, adding the combination of software will give information-technology managers easier and better use of their own services and applications. H-P joins other hardware makers, including rivals International Business Machines Corp. 1 storage company EMC Corp., in buying software companies to boost profit margins.

A risky bet Still, given Mercury Interactive's extensive accounting troubles, the transaction is risky, and investors pushed down H-P's shares almost 4% in after-hours trading after the deal was unveiled. Mercury Interactive was one of the first companies investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission concerning the backdating of executive stock option grants. The company's top executives resigned late last year amid an SEC probe, and earlier this month Mercury Interactive restated its financial results for several years.

The company hasn't filed full results either for 2005 or the first quarter of this year, prompting the Nasdaq Stock Market to delist its shares in January. It said on July 5 that it would report first-quarter results later this month, but it's unclear whether that plan still holds. For the first quarter of 2005, the last quarter Mercury Interactive reported full results, the company earned net income of $31.4 million on sales of $198.8 million. At that time, it had cash of $600 million and 99.43 million shares outstanding.

Doravin payanangal. Two phone calls made to H-P to update the cash and shares outstanding figures weren't returned. H-P's software business had an operating loss of $59 million on revenue of $1.08 billion for its 2005 fiscal year, which ended last October, When H-P reported its second-quarter 2006 results in May, software accounted for $3 million in operating profit, with sales of $330 million. Following the deal, Mountain View, Calif.-based Mercury's operations will become part of H-P's software unit.

Mercury Software

'From a strategic perspective, Mercury had a software business that's a perfect complement to ours,' Hurd said on the call. 'We had been thinking about this (deal) for a while, and now we're focused on making this work, Hurd said.' H-P may set aside reserves related to the deal Mercury Interactive is also the subject of a number of shareholder lawsuits. In response to a question from an analyst about whether H-P has protected itself from Mercury's legal liability, Chief Financial Officer Robert Wayman said on a conference call that H-P 'frankly cannot fully protect against some potential liabilities,' but has done 'a lot of work evaluating the potential magnitude.' When asked whether the company would set aside any reserves related to the deal, Wayman said 'there will be an opportunity I think to take some reserves in purchase accounting, but that will await more information.'

H-P's stock fell to $30.10 in after-hours trading following the announcement, after closing the regular session up 26 cents at $31.33.

April 22, 2011 - The court ordered the authorization of the distribution of the net settlement fund. March 3, 2011 - The court granted a renewed application for attorneys' fees and expenses. August 18, 2010 - The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ordered the judgment of the district court is vacated and the matter is remanded for further proceedings. October 23, 2008 - An objector filed a notice of appeal against the order on the motion for attorneys' fees and expenses. September 26, 2008 - The court granted the motion for attorneys’ fees and expenses.

September 25, 2008 - The court approved the settlement and dismissed the action with prejudice. June 4, 2008 - The court preliminarily approved the settlement. May 16, 2008 - Parties filed a stipulation of settlement. July 30, 2007 - The court granted the defendants‘ motions to dismiss and granted plaintiffs leave to file an amended complaint. November 17, 2006 - Defendants filed numerous motions to dismiss.

September 8, 2006 - The lead plaintiffs filed a consolidated complaint on behalf of investors who purchased Mercury Interactive Corporation (OTC: MERQ) common shares October 17, 2000 to November 1, 2005. The lead plaintiffs allege that the defendants the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by issuing false and misleading statements between October 17, 2000 to November 1, 2005. May 5, 2006 - The lead plaintiffs and lead counsel were appointed. December 8, 2005 - All cases were consolidated.

October 25, 2005 - An additional investor filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of investors who purchased Mercury Interactive Corporation (OTC: MERQ) common shares October 22, 2003 to October 4, 2005. October 20, 2005 - A lead plaintiff motion was filed. September 23, 2005 - Another investor filed a complaint in the U.S.

District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of investors who purchased Mercury Interactive Corporation (OTC: MERQ) common shares October 22, 2003 to August 30, 2005. August 25, 2005 - Plaintiffs filed a corrected complaint. August 19, 2005 - An investor in shares of Mercury Interactive Corporation (OTC: MERQ no longer active and acquired by HP November 2006) filed a lawsuit against Mercury Interactive Corporation over alleged violations of Federal Securities Laws between October 22, 2003 and July 5, 2005. The complaint alleges that from October 22, 2003 and July 5, 2005, Mercury Interactive Corporation, and certain of its officers and directors, were directly involved in Mercury Interactive Corporation at the highest levels and were privy to confidential proprietary information concerning Mercury Interactive Corporation and its business, operations, growth, financial statements and financial condition, as alleged herein. It further alleges that certain of Mercury Interactive Corporation's offices and directors were involved in drafting, producing, reviewing and/or disseminating the materially false and misleading press releases, statements and information alleged herein, knew or recklessly disregarded that materially false and misleading statements were being issued regarding Mercury Interactive Corporation, and approved or ratified these statements, in violation of the Federal Securities Laws.

In addition to those allegations, the complaint further claims that each individual defendant had knowledge of Mercury Interactive Corporation’s problems and was motivated to conceal such problems.