Both companies use a wide range of enterprise software.
H.P. has acquired a string of enterprise software companies including Mercury Interactive, Opsware and Neoware, in recent years.
It has also assembled, through acquisitions, a fledgling line of enterprise software that it calls Microsoft Dynamics.
"We're building a different kind of enterprise software," said Drew Houston, the founder and chief executive of Dropbox.
But the most important battleground may be a different one entirely: the platform for the next generation of enterprise software.
Many IT customers may opt for SAP because they worry that Oracle wants to become the Microsoft of enterprise software.
Oracle wants to become the Microsoft of enterprise software, by offering a complete suite of business programs.
It has also benefited from a full line of enterprise software at a time when buyers increasingly prefer to buy more from a single vendor.
As with Motorola, shares of enterprise software maker BEA Systems were down amid tough competition from rivals and questionable management decisions.
Microsoft offered a 50percentt premium for LinkedIn, but little explanation of how the company's business would fit with its wide array of enterprise software.
In another sign of an impending initial public offering, in 2008, the company hired Godfrey Sullivan, formerly of enterprise software companies like Hyperion, as its chief executive.
