Maybe this isn't out the of realm of conceivability to others, but it was to me...Oracle is a software company (one that runs a lot on Sun hardware), and suddenly becoming a hardware company has got to be a daunting challenge, regardless of who you are or how smart you are.
The implications are staggering across the board. Maybe Oracle decides they don't want to the hardware, just Java and MySQL (...they got it, finally), but then all that Sun hardware and Solaris...? Or maybe they want to make Solaris/Sun h
Its highly unlikely Oracle will maintain Sun's hardware aspect of the business. Sun already has put SPARC into legacy mode. Oracle will probably keep or sell off the hardware products that can sustain itself. It will probably maintain the legacy server stuff, to keep its high-end ticket customers who buy Sun for high-availability systems.
An accepted tactic to grow a customer base is to buyout another company's customer base. Its usually considered to be a cheaper route than investing in taking away a competitor's customer base. This is probably the reason Oracle went for Sun. Oracle has become more services/consultant oriented. It can't really break into IBM's territory, partly because of IBM's hardware components for "complete solutions" or enterprise market. This allows Oracle to grab all the customers IBM hasn't already taken away.
The bigger question is what Oracle plans for Sun's software products, like Solaris, MYSQL, and Java.
I agree that Oracle will kill off Sparc, but I would expect it to retain a Sun-branded hardware business, based on Intel. That will be a key part of the soup-to-nuts stack strategy, I would have thought.
No, what would Oracle gain from selling customized PCs? (I exaggerate, but that's what it is.) It costs money to invest in hardware development and marketing to get companies to buy the hardware package over a cheaper competitor. Companies didn't buy Sun equipment for its hardware. They bought it as a component of an enterprise high-availability system. Sun didn't sell a database product. They sold a platform product to run your database product on. Sun depended on OS lock in to move their hardware pr
Sun's multicore sparc work is basically custom designed to run giant database servers, and giant web servers with giant database back ends. Doing so at lower power draw than the competition has the potential to be a market winner. That alone will not be sufficient, however.
That was a good theory for IBM's attempt to purchase Sun. It doesn't work so well for Oracle, since there isn't that much overlap between Oracle and Sun's product portfolio. Worse for this theory is that there is already a huge overlap between Sun and Oracle *customers*. So, according to your theory, Oracle bought Sun, so that it can sell to Sun customers products they already own. Try again.
Its highly unlikely Oracle will maintain Sun's hardware aspect of the business.
Dude, most of Sun's revenue comes from hardware, either by selling it, or by selling services bundled with it. Software people see sun in terms of Java, MySQL, and so on, but these actually generate very little revenue on their own; to Sun, they're valuable mainly as a way of driving its hardware and service businesses.
If Oracle writes off Sun's hardware business, they will have paid $5 billion ($7 billion plus the cost of assuming Sun's debts, but minus Sun's $3 billion
Safra Katz (Oracle President under Ellison) is saying that he can make Sun's hardware business profitable. That's a credible claim.
I'm surprised more companies weren't interested in buying Sun. They have over $13 billion dollars in revenue. A little bit of fine tuning in the business could mean huge profits.
Sun is phasing out sparc, but aggressively selling UltraSparc.
The cost vs performance is very impressive, and is winning people back from x86. At least in my environment (education).
The oracle database runs really well on the ultrasparcs. We just bought a 4 cpu T2 ultrasparc server, it has 8 cores per cpu for a total of 256 threads. With an edu discount, it cost ~60,000 if I recall correctly. There is nothing remotely as powerful in the x86 realm. http://www.sun.com/processors/UltraSPARC-T2/specs.xml [sun.com]
"You can have my Unix system when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers."
-- Cal Keegan
Wow. Just Wow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe this isn't out the of realm of conceivability to others, but it was to me...Oracle is a software company (one that runs a lot on Sun hardware), and suddenly becoming a hardware company has got to be a daunting challenge, regardless of who you are or how smart you are.
The implications are staggering across the board. Maybe Oracle decides they don't want to the hardware, just Java and MySQL (...they got it, finally), but then all that Sun hardware and Solaris...? Or maybe they want to make Solaris/Sun h
Re:Wow. Just Wow. (Score:5, Informative)
Its highly unlikely Oracle will maintain Sun's hardware aspect of the business. Sun already has put SPARC into legacy mode. Oracle will probably keep or sell off the hardware products that can sustain itself. It will probably maintain the legacy server stuff, to keep its high-end ticket customers who buy Sun for high-availability systems.
An accepted tactic to grow a customer base is to buyout another company's customer base. Its usually considered to be a cheaper route than investing in taking away a competitor's customer base. This is probably the reason Oracle went for Sun. Oracle has become more services/consultant oriented. It can't really break into IBM's territory, partly because of IBM's hardware components for "complete solutions" or enterprise market. This allows Oracle to grab all the customers IBM hasn't already taken away.
The bigger question is what Oracle plans for Sun's software products, like Solaris, MYSQL, and Java.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree that Oracle will kill off Sparc, but I would expect it to retain a Sun-branded hardware business, based on Intel. That will be a key part of the soup-to-nuts stack strategy, I would have thought.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No, what would Oracle gain from selling customized PCs? (I exaggerate, but that's what it is.) It costs money to invest in hardware development and marketing to get companies to buy the hardware package over a cheaper competitor. Companies didn't buy Sun equipment for its hardware. They bought it as a component of an enterprise high-availability system. Sun didn't sell a database product. They sold a platform product to run your database product on. Sun depended on OS lock in to move their hardware pr
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. Kinda like IBM does.
Sparc into legacy mode? (Score:5, Interesting)
Didn't get that impression last time I attended one of their seminars a few weeks ago.
The multicore stuff Sun is doing is miles ahead og anything anybody else is doing,. I hope Oracle do not axe that.
sparc and oracle (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Sun already has put SPARC into legacy mode.
RedHat decided to switch to OpenSolaris.
See, I can make up stupid statements without anything to back it up too.
buying out the customer base (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Hoo boy. Where do you get your facts?
Its highly unlikely Oracle will maintain Sun's hardware aspect of the business.
Dude, most of Sun's revenue comes from hardware, either by selling it, or by selling services bundled with it. Software people see sun in terms of Java, MySQL, and so on, but these actually generate very little revenue on their own; to Sun, they're valuable mainly as a way of driving its hardware and service businesses.
If Oracle writes off Sun's hardware business, they will have paid $5 billion ($7 billion plus the cost of assuming Sun's debts, but minus Sun's $3 billion
Re: (Score:2)
Safra Katz (Oracle President under Ellison) is saying that he can make Sun's hardware business profitable. That's a credible claim.
I'm surprised more companies weren't interested in buying Sun. They have over $13 billion dollars in revenue. A little bit of fine tuning in the business could mean huge profits.
Re: (Score:2)
Sun is phasing out sparc, but aggressively selling UltraSparc.
The cost vs performance is very impressive, and is winning people back from x86. At least in my environment (education).
The oracle database runs really well on the ultrasparcs. We just bought a 4 cpu T2 ultrasparc server, it has 8 cores per cpu for a total of 256 threads. With an edu discount, it cost ~60,000 if I recall correctly. There is nothing remotely as powerful in the x86 realm.
http://www.sun.com/processors/UltraSPARC-T2/specs.xml [sun.com]