Caveat: this is not an official SAP opinion, or anything like it.
Right, let's go. What the hell is Larry Ellison thinking about? He has now bought another software applications company Retek .
Let's do a quick audit here.
Peoplesoft bought JD Edwards
Oracle bought Peoplesoft, including JD Edwards
Oracle has an applications business
Oracle has now bought Retek
Larry has paid a lot of money to have a big problem to deal with. He now has four code bases and application sets to deal with. He has four sets of customers who are all jolly interested in how he is going to create one coherent product set out of this lot, and how long he is going to take. Remember, you are not going to extend the use of any of these products significantly until you know what the future roadmap is going to be, unless you have the confidence that you are going in the direction that the supplier will be taking as well.
Once that direction is clear, at least three of the four codebases will have to be migrated to the new strategic codebase. (Don't give me guff about co-existence. There is such a fundamental difference in the platforms for the different applications that they might be able to sit in the same IT centre, but that's about it. ) When it comes time to migrate, the cost and the disruption is such that you might be as well to look at the whole thing as a new implementation. And so, then you will look at how well you have been served by your current supplier, who might not be the supplier you signed up with, and wonder how happy you were with things. Would they automatically get your new business? Not sure about that, certainly not a 100% of people will make the jump.
Or maybe this is Oracle turning into Computer Associates. (Industry joke motto for CA - "Where good software goes to die.") A portfolio of applications that basically have nothing in common, but that produce maintenance revenue streams for a long time because of the migration costs of moving off the platform. (ERP software is the gift that keeps giving. Sell the licence, and the maintenance for the applications is a percentage fee, usually around 15-20% of the original license per year. ) From a financial point of view that would be an OK approach, but as a technology vision it isn't that inspiring.
Well, sure thing is that Larry Ellison may be mercurial, but is not even remotely stupid, so there will something to watch there, and I for one am curious as to what it will be.
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