Comments on: Oracle's Ellison nails cloud computing

Speaking at OracleWorld, CEO Larry Ellison says the computer industry is more fashion-driven than women's fashion and cloud computing is simply the latest fashion.

[barroness12]

No wonder Larry nails it - in the cloud, no one uses Oracle, it's way too brittle and expensive. The world's already moved to MySQL (Google, Amazon, Yahoo!, even Salesforce.com is leaving Oracle and Larry owns a third of them).

So Larry should keep dreaming of price hikes, but the world's already moving and leaving him behind. I think customers have finally figured out why he's got that grin on his face, and a $300 million dollar boat.

[kswartz26]

barroness12: I think you've missed the point. Larry is not deriding the CONCEPT of cloud computing, just the marketing craze over the terminology. He is saying that Oracle is already doing this, and he's right -- they've had an On Demand (hosted application) offering for many years. A good comparison might be "Web 2.0" or "AJAX" coded websites. It's nothing new, and has been around for years, but suddenly it has a name and everyone is ga-ga over it.

I would also disagree with your premise about "no one uses Oracle". This is far from true. If you're talking about individuals, yes fair point. But major businesses dealing with back-end services are more and more interested in moving their installations off-premises. Look at Salesforce.com, as an example. Or Oracle's own On Demand products (the Siebel-acquired offerings, in particular). Also look at the announcement they made this week where they are allowed licensees to obtain virtual machines of Oracle database and middleware products for use on Amazon's cloud platform (EC2).

Implications that they are losing business to MySQL are very unfounded. Can you cite a reference that says MySQL is taking business away from Oracle in the mid to upper-end of the market?

Say what you want about Larry and his monster-sized ego, but the company is doing extremely well. Judging from their stock performance, their excellent Q1 numbers, and the fact that their middleware base is growing more than 100% year-over-year, I don't think the sentiment you're portraying is at all representative of their customer base.

[hdn777]

You are right kswartz26, that's what I'm talking about for al long time and no one's listening: Cloud, Web 2.0, Ajax, none of them have any real substance. They in fact stand for one of the following:
i) Google does it (that way)
ii) Google has bought (into) it
iii) Looks like it might be bought by Google
iv) One of the previous is true for another (more or less) successful web company, e.g. Amazon, Salesforce, etc.
May be we should use the term "Talknology" instead of "Technology" for that stuff ;-)

[RighteousSoutherner]

I'm no fan of Ellison's, but In a way he has a point. To the end user, what the heck is the basic difference of how a database or application (for purposes of simplicity here) is presented on the screen? You still need a basic network infrastructure (OSI Model), operating system, middleware (to deal with legacy systems and apps) and of coure the end-user application (including scripts) to accomplish your business goals. The only thing cloud computing does away with is the need for local application or application server support. However, it does enhance portability, access and agility in delivering those apps.

The bottom line--Oracle will simply help deliver more apps to data centers where they will be hosted as opposed to the customer's site, if they aren't already.

[brian.lee]

It's kind of like "HD" now everything has HD infront of it.... I remember hearing radio commercials from laser eye surgery clinics "HD Vision"... HD this and HD that....

[AppleSuxLeo]

He has hated MSFT ever since they made him puny ! Larry is nobody compared to Gates.

[friday04]

Um...what?

[bertarmijo]

>>> "I don't understand what we would do differently in the light of cloud"

Larry - As a participant in building the cloud, 3tera has customers that would love to use Oracle if your licenses allowed for redistribution and utility based billing.

[gmsquires]

Yes Larry knows Oracle is limited and slow for large multi database opperations across multiple servers. Check out today's news regarding Oracle going into offering server hardware in conjunction with HP to host things and reduce overall processing times etc. This is in direct competition to IBM, Sun, etc.

[bwvla]

Of course Larry nailed it, the computer industry has long been a slave to fads and fashions. These "future defining" tools and concepts are talked up by sales teams wanting a buck and reporters hoping for a scoop. The truth is everything in our industry is sold as "must haves" and while many turn out to be useful tools or concepts (java, linux, bluetooth, Ajax), precious few ever become a paradigm change such as the invention of the microchip, the introduction of the GUI and mouse, or the advent of the WWW/Internet.

But then again fads and fashions are not unique to the technology sector. Subprime Loans, SUVs, TQM, and Gourmet hamburger restaurants certainly come to mind.

Expect the "Cloud" to be useful for some business models, but not others.

Inevitably there will be penny wise pound foolish managers with big ambitions who will put all of their eggs in the cloud all at once on a wing and a prayer. Inevitably these same managers will also continue to complain about how expensive and unreliable IT is while watching project costs skyrocket and attempting to gauge their CEOs frustration level.

[zato_3]

"Oracle's Ellison nails cloud computing"

Nothing in this article says anything about Cloud Computing - only the buzzword marketing of it.

But whatever CNet / Microsoft can use to discredit anything that competes with Microsoft.....

[allisonsas]

My company decided about a year ago to start looking to MySQL as an option to Oracle licenses (which were rising, precipitously). The Oracle sales rep was furious, but we needed a choice.

At this point, we allow new apps only on MySQL, none of Oracle. Oracle runs our GL, but that's it, we've fenced it off. And the performance and stability of MySQL has been absolutely fantastic. We can also run it on AmazonWS without any payments. We are now beginning to look at commercial service providers for MySQL services, but going back to oracle will never happen, they burned the bridges, it's their own fault.

When I talk to my peers in other organizations, they're going through the same transition. Oracle didn't do themselves a favor with their salesforce. Arrogant and threatening. I hope that's not true of their whole management team, as well.

Perhaps they should buy MySQL.

[botchagalupe]

Did I miss something or did Oracle not announce support for Amazon's EC2 last week?

<a href="http://www.johnmwillis.com/oracle/oracle-on-amazons-cloud-ec2">Oracle on Amazon?s Cloud (EC2)</a>

John
johnmwillis.com

[p-brane]

John, The second comment on this post acknowledged this fact; but glad to see you are here in shining armor defending your venerable Cloud! (grin) Cloud/Utility/Grid/Call it something new today, is good stuff, let's just remove the fluff.

[Sekhar-Ravinutala]

@kswartz26, actually Larry is implying cloud is just a buzzword and which Oracle is handling - see the "...But I don't understand what we would do differently in the light of cloud." quote. We all know the "cloud" term is being severely abused, but Oracle doesn't opearate at the cloud level.

I.e., you could deploy Oracle apps on a cloud as you would on a regular platform. E.g., on EC2 rather than on a local server. No difference. But that's not the point. I can run an app on a phone, desktop, or EC2 - that doesn't mean all these platforms are the same.

Cloud (which I define as similar to grid) is a great concept with terrific business value. If folks are abusing the term, that doesn't make it any less valuable. You can't take a good concept, interpret in bizarre ways, and then declare it a bad concept.

[ewelch]

Dell tried to patent Cloud Computing.

Guess we know what Ellison thinks of that!

[SpeakToMe1]

Ellison is right -- cloud computing is an overused, mushy buzz word that has ceased to have real meaning. Its biggest allure is for the 99% of the population that receive nothing but pain from their close interactions with technology, and who dearly wish that computing in general could be put up in the cloud somewhere.

[gevaperry]

As others pointed out, Oracle has ulterior motives in preventing adoption of cloud computing and maintaining the status quo. I answer Ellison?s questions with three very concrete things Oracle could change in the light of cloud computing on my blog: http://gevaperry.typepad.com/main/2008/09/larry-ellisons-anti-cloud-computing-rant.html

[ctkeene]

Larry's rant is an extraordinary example of whistling past the graveyard. Oracle's huge transformation over the last 10 years has been from an infrastructure company (databases & middleware) to an applications company (ERP, CRM, SFA ect). Now, just as this transformation is completed, along comes an infrastructure that will obsolete all the applications Oracle just got done rolling up. No wonder he sounds pissed - you would be too if you just spent >$20B on a bunch of wasting assets that are going to be shafted by the SaaS shift just as Siebel was eviscerated by SalesForce. The dead giveaway is that Larry focuses on SaaS profitability rather than SaaS market share - he knows the customers are deserting him in droves, what really angers him is that he can't make as much money in the SaaS world.

[vishakha_ate]

All the way what is Cloud Computing is used?