Oracle says to buy rival Hyperion for $3.3 billion

Oracle Corp. said on Thursday it would buy Hyperion Solutions Corp. for $3.3 billion to boost its position in the fast-growing market for tools to help executives analyze business performance.

Oracle, which has a market value of more than $80 billion, will pay $52 in cash for each Hyperion share, a 21 percent premium over Wednesday's closing price of $42.84.

Oracle has spent more than $20 billion over the past two years on acquisitions of companies such as Siebel and PeopleSoft in search of growth as its core database software market matures. Oracle is the world's biggest database software maker and generates most of its revenue from those products.