Oracle raises software prices (again)
Oracle: Kings of pricing.
One year after raising many prices by 20 percent or more, Oracle is once again raising prices--by 40 percent for certain products.
Interestingly, the products receiving the big price bumps are not the core database or application servers, but instead the administrative tools used for monitoring and compliance.
I'd certainly like to say this is price gouging, but really it is just smart business. Oracle knows database sales can't grow forever and that customers will sooner or later need to have additional tooling. Strategically, it's much smarter to price non-core components higher to ensure consistent adoption and cash flow of the primary product line.
This does introduce a few strategy questions related to the impending Sun acquisition--namely, how does Oracle price MySQL and its related packages, and will the existing tools work with MySQL or will customers running both be forced to buy two sets of tools? And will MySQL users be comfortable with Oracle changing pricing policies?
Pricing changes are common across all software companies, but open-source companies like MySQL have generally stuck to simple models to keep the costs of sales low and volumes high.
The big question is if Oracle owning MySQL helps customers. There are no doubt scenarios in which it will be convenient to buy and be supported from one source (the mythical "one throat to choke"), but it's hard to see how the hands-on approach of Oracle sales jives with MySQL's adoption to sales conversion process.
As a side note, if you think the GPL and open-source licensing is confusing, take a gander at Oracle's Application Licensing Table (PDF), which seems straightforward until you need to use a non-vanilla installation.
Follow me on Twitter @daveofdoom.
Dave Rosenberg dishes up "Software, Interrupted" with nearly 15 years of technology and marketing experience that spans from Bell Labs to multiple start-up IPOs to open-source enterprise software companies. He is co-founder of MuleSource and currently serves as the general manager of Hardy Way. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can contact Dave via e-mail at softwareinterrupted@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @daveofdoom. 
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Maybe because SQLServer only works on a Microsoft platform and not Linux/Unix/Mac etc ... ;-)
Mac would not be part of this picture because no Enterprise DB worth mentioning runs on the Mac platform. Unix is dead and dying leaving Linux... Windows vs. Linux - the old classic fight.
I don't think businesses make decision based on their biases for companies (i.e. Microsoft = Crap, UNIX FTW) - they make decisions based on how well a product serves it present and future needs.
I have worked in a WMS (Warehouse management software) company in the past, and when I joined the company, I had similar biases like yacahuma. I was very much surprised when I went to client sites to find that more than 60% of our clients preferred to run SQL rather than Oracle even though all our software were compatible with both DBs and our sales team did not bias one way or the other!
Anyway, this article is not about databases, since it seems that Oracle has not increased the price for that anyway. In ERP world, Oracle is the king, and it makes sense that they can get away with increasing prices on administration software for ERP markets.
And ditto your "jajaja?" reply. I think the poster was just trying to be funny by "laughing" in another language... Seeing that English is the proverbial "man" of langues. :)
Cody
In database you can already find cheap databases that doesn't require so much optimization or gb handling as most of the databases are not sophisticated or big.
Yes, they are big in apps market. Soon they realize that others are catching. Then what.
On one hand, Oracle Middleware (Fusion) they are trying to put their foot into the door on the other hand they are playing this dominance game. People do realize that if they give dominance to oracle that they are toast.
Good luck to Oracle in the future.
In database you can already find cheap databases that doesn't require so much optimization or gb handling as most of the databases are not sophisticated or big.
Yes, they are big in apps market. Soon they realize that others are catching. Then what.
On one hand, Oracle Middleware (Fusion) they are trying to put their foot into the door on the other hand they are playing this dominance game. People do realize that if they give dominance to oracle that they are toast.
Good luck to Oracle in the future.
Oracle, relative to more nimble competitors, has slowed down product innovation. For the last 5 years Oracle has resorted to business-model innovation. The essence of Oracle's business model innovation is "buy a mature company (e.g., Hyperion) and live off its maintenance" and "buy a struggling small company (e.g. Demantra) and use Oracle's sales army to sell more licenses." Raising prices is another step in the business model.
Customers have more choice these days - open source (Compiere for ERP, SugarCRM for CRM etc.), SAAS (e.g., Netsuite for ERP, Salesforce.com for CRM etc.) with more options in cloud computing (which enable the tieing together of services from unlimited vendors). Increased choices will lead to lower actualy prices for customers.
The scary thing about Oracle raising prices is that it might just work. In the short term, they will likely drive revenue -- especially valuable to them in today's economy. But I believe that the longer term vision of innovating new products and delivery mechanisms will eventually win out. We've seen this movie before... the disruptive technology innovation takes a while to gain momentum, but once it does, there is no stopping it.
- Anthony Deighton, QlikTech (www.qlikview.com)
- by almhagr2000 July 26, 2009 1:41 AM PDT
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