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BOSTON, Nov 11 (Reuters) – Business software maker SAP AG (SAPG.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) has hired an executive who used to run one of archrival Oracle Corp’s (ORCL.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) biggest development groups, putting him in charge of an emerging business at SAP.

SAP, the world’s top maker of business management software, named John Wookey to the post of executive vice president in charge of developing Web-based software products for large corporations, SAP spokesman Saswato Das said on Tuesday.

Web-based distribution, known as "software as a service" because programs are delivered over the Internet instead of residing on a customer’s computers, is one of the fastest-growing segments of the software market.

Wookey was formerly a senior vice president at Oracle, where he supervised development of its business management programs. Oracle is the world’s second-largest maker of that type of software after SAP.

He left Oracle about a year ago as part of a shakeup in its software development organization.

Oracle spokeswoman Deborah Hellinger declined comment. (Reporting by Jim Finkle, editing by Matthew Lewis)

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