There is a CIO at a major UK retailer who, I suspect, is not untypical of many. He tells the tale of how, once upon a time, he used Oracle as his database provider, JD Edwards for his back-office enterprise resource planning (ERP), PeopleSoft for his human resources and talent management, Hyperion for his business intelligence and analytics and Siebel for his customer relationship management (CRM). Now he just uses Oracle!

That's not because he's taken a decision to standardise on the Oracle software stack. In fact in some cases – such as his CRM selection – he deliberately chose not use Oracle. But Oracle had other ideas. After more than two decades of growing his company through a combination of ruthlessly aggressive selling and in-house development of new technology, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison decided five years ago that the way to win market share in the 21st century was to go out and buy yourself some extra slices.

So over the past five years, Oracle has spent a cool $34 billion on 50 software company acquisitions, including PeopleSoft (and with it JD Edwards), Hyperion and Siebel, as well as number of more tactical acquisitions to flesh out its portfolio and enable it to address some vertical markets, such as the insurance sector or the telco market – in which Oracle now has arguably the most complete 'industry-specific' offering among the enterprise software giants.

Of course it's just tough luck if you didn't want to be an Oracle customer, but Oracle argues that what it's been doing actually mirrors the sourcing decisions being taken by client companies anyway. “Many large customers have been in the process of consolidating suppliers,” suggests Sergio Giacoletto, the man in charge of Oracle in Europe, Middle East and Africa. “So we have been consolidating the industry at the same time as European multinationals have been trying to consolidate their suppliers. That means the expansion of our own offerings is sitting very well with our customers.”

He has a point – up to a point. Certainly the 43,000 Oracle customers who descended on San Francisco this week for the Oracle OpenWorld conference showed no sign of obvious discontent. Rival vendors gleefully predicted following every significant acquisition by Oracle that there would be mass defections by the customers, fearful of falling into Ellison's clutches, but in reality they never came.

Now it might be argued that the enormity of ripping out an enterprise software implementation and starting again was simply too daunting for most customers, but the harsh reality for the rest of the market is that in most cases being under the Oracle umbrella has probably secured the long term existence of their chosen products rather than threatened it. Siebel, PeopleSoft and JD Edwards have all had upgrades and continued support – and a commitment to carry on supporting them forever.

Of course, forever is a long way off – and it's inevitable that as Oracle rolls out a next generation of software the pressure will mount for customers to migrate onwards and upwards – but the truth is Oracle is getting pretty good at managing acquisitions and keeping customers happy.

There was much love and group hugs all round for the latest members of the Oracle family this week, the BEA Systems customers who were the latest major acquisition by Oracle. BEA is a great example of the new world order in the software game. For years the firm was undermined and haunted by takeover rumours and predictions of its imminent demise; now it has clear long term future as a central component of a wider IT architecture.

Indeed, there wasn't a murmur of discontent to be heard from the BEA camp this week as the customers tucked into their conference party beers and danced to Elvis Costello (corporate dollars, anyone?) and UB40 (ditto!).

Later in the week Hewlett Packard CEO Mark Hurd is due to address the OpenWorld conference where he'll be talking about the new HP now that the EDS takeover has been formalised. The previous HP regime managed to be make a complete pig's ear out of the takeover of Compaq.

While Hurd might seem more obviously in control than his predecessor, he could do himself no harm by grabbing a few minutes with Ellison and his sidekicks – the smooth-as-silk Charles Phillips and the inestimable behind-the-scenes operator Safra Catz – and pick their brains on how to complete a successful transition without scaring your customers.