Oracle: Soccer Mom Strategy
October 1, 2008
I have been thinking about the low profile Secure Enterprise Search 10g has had since May 2008. Oracle bought my lunch, gave a dog-and-pony show, and commented on my addled goose Web log. That was it. At the Oracle shin dig last week near the old Sea World, Oracle revealed its strategy for maintaining its grip on the enterprise database market. Oracle is implementing what I call the “soccer mom strategy.” Here’s how it works:
- Get a big vehicle. An SUV or a Cadillac Escalade will do
- Stuff it full of kids, soccer balls, cleats, coolers, and maybe a big friendly dog or two
- Drive it to a destination
- Unleash the goodies within
- Load up again and repeat.
Here’s how Oracle implements this procedure. Click here to read the news release about Oracle Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition Plus 10.1.3.4 (Oracle BI Suite EE Plus). Now this is a stuffed minivan, and you can get options. These range from Oracle’s security server to a platoon of Oracle engineers to customized your OBISEEP to your heart’s content.
A soccer mom implementing her “pack it in” strategy before picking up the team, delivering the kids, and then ferrying the little ones back to their homes. Whew.
What’s going on?
In addition to data management and support you get
- The Oracle EPM Workspace. “EPM” is Oracle speak for enterprise performance management, which is utilities and an interface to make Oracle go faster without adding CPUs and clusters right out of the box. The Workspace allows a database administrator with knowledge of business intelligence to make it easier for end-users, and I quote, “to access and interact with Oracle BI data alongside Oracle EPM System data through a single, thin-client Web interface”
- Oracle Hyperion Smart View for Office. This is a business intelligence system that “offers users a common, powerful solution for integrating Oracle EPM System content, and now Oracle BI content, with Microsoft Office suite of desktop applications”
- Oracle Smart Space. The Smart Space is a data management gizmo to that an administrator can deploy Oracle business intelligence outputs in dashboards and reports. A user can access data in a “personalized desktop gadgets to enable real-time information access and collaboration.”
Wait. There is more. You get Oracle Fusion (apparently this is not an orphaned product) and a metadata conversion tool. All this for $2,000 per user or $295,000 per processor.
Just as a soccer mom stuffs her minivan to bursting so has Oracle packed OBISEEP with functions.
Now I think I know what’s happened to SES10g. Oracle is embedding BEA and other acquisitions’ technology into these minivan products. Oracle search is going to become the equivalent of the center console in the minivan. I have a hunch that SES10g will just become part of a broader product just as Microsoft has included search with SharePoint. If I am right, SES10g will not long be a stand alone product. Could this be another enterprise search system team left humming the tune for “another one bites the dust?” I hope not.
If you have a different vision for Oracle SES10g, let me know. I’m just speculating, but I think the soccer mom strategy may make it tough for SES10g in its present form to get to the soccer game alone.
Stephen Arnold, October 1, 2008
Comments
2 Responses to “Oracle: Soccer Mom Strategy”
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Sounds like a stuffed van, a couple of kitchen sinks you don’t really need, and an empty wallet.
Otis Gospodnetic,
Give a hard working software soccer mom a break.
Stephen Arnold, October 1, 2008