An Oracle spokeswoman didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

IBM is pleased by the NAD's decision, IBM spokesman Jeff Cross said in an interview. "This was hardly an apples-to-apples comparison," he added. "This was an apples-to-oranges comparison. They compared a new Exadata to a six-year-old Power System."

Exadata, first introduced in 2008, combines Oracle software with servers and Infiniband networking.

The Exadata system also was running Oracle's 11g database whereas the customer was using an earlier version, 10g, on the Power Systems hardware, according to Cross.

One observer took a measured view of Oracle and IBM's spat.