Oracle is flying high, but customer needs aren't a first-class consideration
 

First Priorities

In Larry Ellison’s own words, it was a hell of a week for Oracle. In the span of four days, June 27 to June 30, the company entangled itself in the infamous “Garbagegate” controversy, announced what executive VP Gary Bloom called the most significant change in product packaging in Oracle’s history, and lost president and company savior Ray Lane in a “mutual” decision after months (if not years) of speculation about his future.

Viewed on the surface, these events are seemingly disparate. But if we look beneath that surface, the contours of a theme emerge: If Oracle is to serve as our example, corporate image has completely replaced customer needs as the guiding light in the enterprise software industry.

Bitter Suite

The “trash for cash” controversy, in which investigators in Oracle’s pay rifled through the garbage of industry trade groups to uncover evidence of Microsoft’s alleged manipulation of public opinion, will be immortalized as a comic footnote to Bill Gates’ travails. However, the controversy says more about Larry Ellison than it does about Microsoft: namely, that Ellison is so obsessed by Microsoft’s image in the marketplace, he will resort to corporate espionage to tarnish it. Does he really think that uncovering Microsoft’s public relations activities, no matter how unsavory, will change a single mind one way or the other, not to mention make one Oracle customer’s job any easier? Paradoxically, it’s Oracle’s image that suffered in the process.

Lost in the ensuing media frenzy — and who can say whether it was to Oracle’s chagrin or relief — was the company’s sweeping consolidation of many of its products into two new suites: Oracle Internet Application Server 8i (IAS) and Oracle Internet Developer Suite.

The former, which replaces the more general-purpose Oracle Application Server, combines J2EE-compliant component services, Web services (through the ubiquitous Apache Web server), portal services, and in a first for app servers, data caching and query and reporting into a “complete and simple Internet Platform.” However, at least one analyst—Giga Information Group’s Mike Gilpin—thinks Oracle is overselling the actual degree of integration and simplification involved. And in terms of BI, industry expert Nigel Pendse doubts the IAS query and reporting framework will have much of an impact beyond strictly Oracle shops.

Similarly, Oracle Internet Developer Suite — containing JDeveloper, Oracle Forms, Oracle Portal, and even Reports and Discoverer — appears to be little more than a pretty bouillabaisse lacking any true architectural integration. Oracle contends the suite contains all the tools a developer needs to build e-business applications, but Giga’s Carl Zetie told me that all Oracle has done is “make the tools simple to sell but difficult to buy.” As Zetie sees it, the company’s real goal in bundling these tools is to “enable the sales force to sell them without necessarily understanding them.” How’s that for focusing on customer needs?

Out of Lane

The timing of Lane’s departure was suspicious — the announcement arrived on the heels of Garbagegate, and after market close immediately preceding the Independence Day holiday weekend — but his role has been shrinking for some time. Lane’s influence began to wane a couple years ago when Ellison took personal responsibility for Oracle’s transition toward Internet-based operations. That proj- ect, which was designed to bolster the company’s “e-business” image, also weakened Lane’s control over day-to-day operations.