Channel Strategies for the CIO- Ellison: Oracle will buck services-buying trend
While HP and Dell
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- may be spending billions on IT services firms, Oracle will not follow suit, according to company CEO Larry Ellison. Some Oracle partners agree that may be true … for now.
- Oracle Partner Network changes stress VAR specializations
- Oracle hardware may be a hard sell
- Oracle to bestow metals on its partners
- Oracle OpenWorld 2009 report
- Blog: The Oracle conspiracy
- OOW highlights: The Governator and Ellison's $10M challenge
- Sun partners burnt at Oracle OpenWorld
- Top five questions for this year's Oracle OpenWorld
- Run up to Oracle OpenWorld 2009
- VARs turn wary eye on Sun-Oracle combo
- Oracle's silence boosts angst around Sun's hardware future
- Oracle OpenWorld 2008 coverage
Oracle continued its push to get VARs to specialize in high-growth, higher margin areas. By honing industry- and technology-specific skills, partners can solve customer problems and boost their own profitability, Oracle Corp.'s co-presidents Charles Phillips and Safra Catz said.
Oracle is now a hardware company, or will be soon. But adjusting to that business won't be easy, said Oracle and Sun Microsystems partners at Oracle OpenWorld 2009.
Oracle will change its partner program in an attempt to make it easier for VARs to distinguish themselves by areas of expertise. Top-level partners will have to pay more to earn their designation and the Oracle Partner Network will replace its Certified Advantage Partner, Certified Partner and Partner levels with Platinum, Gold and Silver tiers.
Check out more Oracle OpenWorld 2009 show coverage at sister site SearchOracle.com
Suppose the real endgame of Oracle's Sun Microsystems buy, when it finally becomes official, is to take hardware (and related services) off the table in large accounts? How happy would Larry Ellison be to block HP hardware (and services) and IBM hardware (and services) from shared accounts? Very, I'm guessing.
Larry Ellison's milking his latest anti-IBM jihad for all it's worth. Now he's challenged anyone to make IBM hardware run Oracle database as fast as it does on the Exadata. If they can do it, they can take $10 million of Larry's (or Oracle's) money. Ellison also brought embattled California guv Arnold Schwarzenegger up on stage to talk up tech love.
The show did not open well for Sun partners that are already reaching for antianxiety meds as the Sun Microsystems acquisition finalizes.
As Oracle keeps trying to close its Sun Microsystems acquisition, the top Oracle OpenWorld queries are locked up this year. But partners and solution providers still have other nagging issues they want addressed at the show.
Virtual Iron VARs left in a lurch as Oracle shuts down product line
News that Oracle will suspend Virtual Iron product development and stop taking orders from new customers put VI VARs in a pinch. Oracle bought Virtual Iron and its virtualization expertise in May 2009.
Many channel players see the impending convergence of Sun Microsystems and Oracle as a melding of two direct sales champions. They view Sun and Oracle as vendors that built their businesses on a direct-sales model and that only engaged VARs when small and medium-sized businesses emerged as a big customer base.
As the Oracle buyout of Sun Microsystems nears completion, tension has ratcheted up among Sun partners and customers who worry that the $7.4 billion acquisition, announced in April, will mean big changes for their businesses. First and foremost is confusion about what Oracle Corp., a software powerhouse, plans to do with Sun's flagship SPARC hardware business.
News out of last year's conference included details on the HP-built Exadata 'database machine' and partners pining for (but not getting) a piece of Oracle's lucrative maintenance and support business.
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