Close
  • Latest News
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Video
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
Read Down
Sign in
Close
Welcome!Log into your account
Forgot your password?
Read Down
Password recovery
Recover your password
Close
Search
Logo
Logo
  • Latest News
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Video
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
More
    Home Cloud
    • Cloud
    • Database
    • Networking
    • Storage

    Oracle Will Focus Sun Servers on High End: Ellison

    Written by

    Jeff Burt
    Published December 18, 2009
    Share
    Facebook
    Twitter
    Linkedin

      eWEEK content and product recommendations are editorially independent. We may make money when you click on links to our partners. Learn More.

      Once it gets Sun Microsystems under its wing, Oracle will not compete in the high-volume, low-margin server market, ceding that space to Hewlett-Packard and Dell, according to Oracle CEO Larry Ellison.

      Instead, the software giant will focus Sun’s SPARC/Solaris and Intel-based systems on the high-end server market and as the basis for Oracle’s converged data center strategy, Ellison said during Oracle’s conference call Dec. 17 announcing the company’s second-quarter financial earnings.

      “Sun really does not now or ever will have the volumes to compete in the high-volume, low-margin business of just selling an Intel server with Windows on it or Linux on it one at a time,” Ellison said. “The high-volume, low-margin is a good business as long as you have high volumes. This is something that Dell and HP are very good at.”

      He said Oracle will instead opt to market Sun’s servers in the “high-value, high-performance” space, with SMP systems like Sun’s SPARC Enterprise Server M9000, a mainframe-class system that can scale up to 64 processors and 256 cores.

      The high-end servers also will be a foundation for Oracle’s converged data center strategy, which also will include storage, networking and Oracle virtualization technologies, all tied together by Oracle and Sun software, Ellison said.

      He said that such solutions essentially are what are called private clouds, and that future enterprise data centers will be more about tightly integrated solutions than building environments piecemeal.

      “Our overall strategy going forward … is not to sell individual, industry-standard components, but group them together in products like Exadata.”

      Oracle’s Exadata Database Machine, which is a combination of Sun hardware and Oracle database software, which was introduced earlier this year and among the first steps in tying Oracle and Sun technologies together.

      During the same conference call, Oracle President Charles Phillips said demand for the Exadata is ramping quickly, and that Oracle is busy trying to keep up with orders, including those from some customers looking for more than one system.

      “Exadata is on fire,” Phillips said. “It’s a red-hot product.”

      It’s important for Ellison to continue to talk about Oracle’s plans for Sun’s hardware business. Rivals like Hewlett-Packard and IBM are using the uncertainty caused by Oracle’s planned $7.4 billion acquisition of Sun-and the delays around the deal, as Oracle awaits the go-ahead from the European Commission-to lure Sun customers away.

      Officials with HP, who on Dec. 15 announced that they are partnering with Microsoft, Novell and Red Hat in their Sun Complete Care program aimed at enticing Sun customers, said that in the 12 months up to Oct. 31, more than 350 Sun customers had made the move to HP.

      Ellison said Oracle’s decision to focus Sun hardware on the high-end and in its unified data center initiative will be a key differentiator for the hardware business going forward. It will be a high-margin business for Oracle, and a high-value one for its customers, who will not have to worry about integrating disparate components. Instead, they will have everything already tightly integrated.

      “We think that’s what the computing business is going to look like for larger enterprises in the future,” he said.

      It also will bring Oracle into direct competition with the likes of Cisco Systems, HP, Dell and IBM, all of which offer solutions in the burgeoning market for unified data center solutions.

      Ellison did not elaborate on the future of Sun’s UltraSPARC “Niagara” line of multithreaded processors, which are designed more for high-demand systems such as Web servers, rather than for high-end systems.

      Despite antitrust concerns from European regulators around Oracle’s owning of MySQL should it buy Sun, Oracle officials during the call were confident that the EC would approve the deal sometime in January. They also said they expect Sun to add $1.5 billion in profits to Oracle during the first full fiscal year after the deal is closed.

      After two days of hearings before the European Commission Dec. 11 and 12, Oracle officials issued a list of 10 commitments they said they will keep for five years regarding MySQL in an effort to assuage concerns from the EC, competitors and users of the open-source database technology.

      Oracle President Safra Catz said that during the hearing, several customers and Oracle user groups testified in favor of the deal. She also noted that more than 60 Congressmen and the U.S. Department of Justice also offered their support of the deal to the European regulators.

      Jeff Burt
      Jeff Burt
      Jeffrey Burt has been with eWEEK since 2000, covering an array of areas that includes servers, networking, PCs, processors, converged infrastructure, unified communications and the Internet of things.

      Get the Free Newsletter!

      Subscribe to Daily Tech Insider for top news, trends & analysis

      Get the Free Newsletter!

      Subscribe to Daily Tech Insider for top news, trends & analysis

      MOST POPULAR ARTICLES

      Artificial Intelligence

      9 Best AI 3D Generators You Need...

      Sam Rinko - June 25, 2024 0
      AI 3D Generators are powerful tools for many different industries. Discover the best AI 3D Generators, and learn which is best for your specific use case.
      Read more
      Cloud

      RingCentral Expands Its Collaboration Platform

      Zeus Kerravala - November 22, 2023 0
      RingCentral adds AI-enabled contact center and hybrid event products to its suite of collaboration services.
      Read more
      Artificial Intelligence

      8 Best AI Data Analytics Software &...

      Aminu Abdullahi - January 18, 2024 0
      Learn the top AI data analytics software to use. Compare AI data analytics solutions & features to make the best choice for your business.
      Read more
      Latest News

      Zeus Kerravala on Networking: Multicloud, 5G, and...

      James Maguire - December 16, 2022 0
      I spoke with Zeus Kerravala, industry analyst at ZK Research, about the rapid changes in enterprise networking, as tech advances and digital transformation prompt...
      Read more
      Video

      Datadog President Amit Agarwal on Trends in...

      James Maguire - November 11, 2022 0
      I spoke with Amit Agarwal, President of Datadog, about infrastructure observability, from current trends to key challenges to the future of this rapidly growing...
      Read more
      Logo

      eWeek has the latest technology news and analysis, buying guides, and product reviews for IT professionals and technology buyers. The site’s focus is on innovative solutions and covering in-depth technical content. eWeek stays on the cutting edge of technology news and IT trends through interviews and expert analysis. Gain insight from top innovators and thought leaders in the fields of IT, business, enterprise software, startups, and more.

      Facebook
      Linkedin
      RSS
      Twitter
      Youtube

      Advertisers

      Advertise with TechnologyAdvice on eWeek and our other IT-focused platforms.

      Advertise with Us

      Menu

      • About eWeek
      • Subscribe to our Newsletter
      • Latest News

      Our Brands

      • Privacy Policy
      • Terms
      • About
      • Contact
      • Advertise
      • Sitemap
      • California – Do Not Sell My Information

      Property of TechnologyAdvice.
      © 2024 TechnologyAdvice. All Rights Reserved

      Advertiser Disclosure: Some of the products that appear on this site are from companies from which TechnologyAdvice receives compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products appear on this site including, for example, the order in which they appear. TechnologyAdvice does not include all companies or all types of products available in the marketplace.

      ×