San Francisco, July 15 (DPA) Sun Microsystems has warned that earnings would fall below expectations in the fourth quarter, which is also likely to be its last as an independent company.

A Silicon Valley pioneer whose servers helped form the basis of the Internet and still power many large enterprises, Sun is close to completing a $7.38 billion sale to Oracle Corp after a series of huge losses pushed down its share price.

Oracle, which edged out International Business Machines Corp to buy Sun, predicts the acquisition will boost its profits.

Once one of Silicon Valley's most influential companies, Sun reacted later than competitors to a shift to low-price server systems.