A source at Oracle Corp denied the company had canceled the keynote speech of Salesforce.com Inc Chief Executive Marc Benioff at Oracle OpenWorld and said Oracle had instead changed the time of the speech.

Oracle told Salesforce.com that it had to move the speech to October 6 from October 5 to make room for an Oracle customer event that needed a bigger venue because it was oversold, according to the Oracle source who asked not to be named because the details were not public.

The denial came after increasingly bitter rival Salesforce.com had put out a public statement advertising an alternative venue, saying Oracle just canceled the speech.

(Reporting by Jim Finkle in Boston, Writing by Sinead Carew in New York; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

Marc Benioff Oracle Keynote