Maureen O'Gara

Oracle said Thursday that it's buying Eloqua for its cloud-based marketing automation and revenue performance management software.

It's agreed to pay $23.50 a share, a 31% premium over Eloqua's close Wednesday. Oracle said it would lay out $871 net of Eloqua's cash. It seems we might figure about $811 million.

Eloqua, which got started in 2000, only IPO'd in August, raising $92 million at about $12 a share so Oracle is paying close to double the IPO price. The Wall Street Journal said it "has a history of losses and has warned it may not be consistently profitable in the future."

Thomas Kurian, the head of Oracle Development, said, Eloqua's marketing automation cloud "will become the centerpiece of the Oracle Marketing Cloud and is an important addition to the Oracle Customer Experience offering, which includes the Oracle Sales Cloud, Oracle Commerce Cloud, Oracle Service Cloud, Oracle Content Cloud and Oracle Social Cloud." It's supposed to help companies transform the way they market, sell, support and serve their customers.

Eloqua should enable "organizations to provide a highly personalized and unified experience across channels, create brand loyalty through social and online interactions, grow revenue by driving more qualified leads to sales teams, and provide superior service at every touch point."

The deal should close in the first half.

Eloqua lives in Virginia and sells its widgetry for $2,000 a month for four-10 users or $6,400 a month for 250 users. It claims over 1,000 customers including folks like American Express, Cisco, VMware, Adobe and Dell.