Oracle/Sun Deal Reaction: Is Larry Building An Ever Larger Dinosaur?
By Tom Foremski - April 20, 2009
Vivek Ranadive, CEO of Tibco Software (Tibco is a sponsor of SVW) has been in Silicon Valley for more than 25 years and is one of its top entrepreneurs and very well connected. Here are some notes from our conversation:
- I'm a little saddened to see Sun go. Scott McNealy (Sun co-founder) helped me when I was starting my business by giving me a Sun workstation.
- Sun should have kept innovating. It was when it stopped that its problems began and top people such as Eric Schmidt started leaving.
- Larry Ellison seems to be putting all his energies into building an ever larger dinosaur. He just seems to be interested in the maintenance revenues that a business can bring in. Oracle doesn't invest in innovation.
- The new entrants such as Cisco Systems benefit from this deal because customers will be looking for alternative suppliers, they won't want to give Oracle all of their business. The same is true for Tibco, this deal is fantastic for us, we will benefit because customers don't want all their eggs in one basket.
- Java is a big a loser. SAP put a lot of work behind Java, this will hurt them.
- Oracle may have to sell MySQL because of anti-trust concerns.
- Open source is a big loser. 'Oracle and open source' has always been an oxymoron.
- Larry Ellison needs to show that he can reinvent Oracle for this new era of virtualization, and cloud computing. It's not clear that he can, he seems just to be interested in the maintenance revenues. He's said before that he doesn't believe in cloud computing.
- Larry Ellison has transformed Oracle into a private equity firm, and he's doing better than any of the private equity firms.
- Oracle might buy Accenture next, it needs a strong services company if it is going to go up against IBM. But there is just one IBM.
- - -
Please see: Mastermind Strategist Larry Ellison: Oracle Snaps Up Sun And Throws Down Gauntlet To IBM
From Wikipedia:
"Vivek Ranadive (b. 1957, Mumbai, India) is the Chairman, CEO and Founder of TIBCO Software, the computer software technology company he founded in 1985. The Palo Alto company employs 1,600 and has annual revenue of more than $500 million. Ranadive's New York Times business bestseller, "The Power of Now: How Winning Companies Sense and Respond to Change Using Real-time Technology" has been widely used in academia.
Ranadive grew up in Juhu area of Mumbai and was the youngest of three children. One of Ranadive's earliest dreams was to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which he learned of through a documentary film on the institution. Described as "a true visionary in a valley full of seers," by the August 10, 2004 issue of Information Age, left Bombay at age 17 with enough money to last two months. In 1975 Ranadive entered MIT and in four years, he completed a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering and a master's in mechanical engineering. He received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1983."
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Comments (8)
Is this guy kidding or what. He's been talking about being Oracle's size for years and is like a little mouse in the shadow of a giant that actually seems to move faster than his company. Sure, there's David and Goliath, but tibco's sling is older and more beat up than Oracle's huge guns. It's like a major league pitcher throwing to a t-ball player. And those in glass houses shouldn't throw pebbles. Doesn't most of tibco's new revenues come from acquisitions? What's organic and innovative there?
Posted: April 21, 2009 11:55 AM
Joe: You have to hand it to Vivek that he is making a point that few others have the cojones to do: Is Larry building an ever larger empire of maintenance revenues, or is he serious about leaving a legacy?
I think this is an interesting point in history, this is where Oracle could potentially take on the world. We'll have to see.
Posted: April 22, 2009 11:02 PM
Wait a minute. Oracle owns MySQL now? I think this ia very bad news - and I'm an Oracle developer.
I've been wondering for a while if Larry really has a clear plan of action or if he's just throwing his money at anything that might seem relevant.
Putting more money into training support staff would be a better investment IMHO.
Posted: April 23, 2009 6:09 AM
That's been the same questions asked for years. Did it really take the Sun deal to bring it up? Sun operated like a non-profit (especially for shareholders) the minute the bubble burst, it was time to make the call. And, Oracle is hardly alone with IBM, Microsoft and Google out there. Salesforce jumped to over $1b in revenue as tibco continued to try to figure things out, so there seems to be plenty of opportunity for companies to emerge and obtain business. And, by the way, dozens of media outlets have the "cojones" to report scepticism over the deal and seeing as how Oracle probably does a lot of advertising with them, I'd say their risk is far greater than a competitor saying something. It's just a page out of Larry's book on Bill Gates. Well, I know Larry and tibco's CEO is no Larry.
Posted: April 23, 2009 8:28 AM
Joe: Fair points about Oracle but this isn't about Tibco saying it's better than Oracle, I'm not sure where you get that from.
Posted: April 23, 2009 11:02 AM
Now that is silly Tom. Of course that's what tibco is saying. Oracle offers piece for piece the same stuff (Fusion) tibco has therefore competing for the same opportunities. The little market down the block definitely competes with the supermarket, no matter how many other big markets that supermarket buys.
Posted: April 23, 2009 12:02 PM
Must say this guy sounds like a kid whome someone stolen a lollypop.
- I'm a little saddened to see Sun go. Scott McNealy (Sun co-founder) helped me when I was starting my business by giving me a Sun workstation.
This shows he is emotionally bind to company which is, now, no more
- Oracle doesn't invest in innovation.
I know Oracle never was "trandy" nor "fancy", but at the time I was working on it (9i) that product was centuries ahead compition. Competitive RDBMS still anounce some features as revolutionary, that were introduced by Oracle ages ago.
- Java is a big a loser. SAP put a lot of work behind Java, this will hurt them.
Oracle depends so much on Java, that this sounds redicolous. To be honest, Oracle's java-based tools/IDE sucked so much, that ISVs like Quest selling their tools in 1:1 ratio to Oracle's licences :))))
- Open source is a big loser. 'Oracle and open source' has always been an oxymoron.
Maybe yes, at the moment, but as everyone else are heading to open source initiatives, I bet Oracle will too.
- Larry Ellison this, Larry Ellison that...
Give me back my lollypop
After all, he lives/works at the epicenter, so could be that he knows something that we don't.
Posted: April 23, 2009 2:23 PM
It is sad that this guy has the 'sour grapes' mentality. Tibco is pretty dated technology. And although Oracle seems to have its hands in everyone's pie, that is what it takes to build an ongoing business. Grow or die. Oracle will shortly reach the critical mass in distributive RDBMS. When it does, they will be come instutitionalized like IBM and Microsoft. Like or not, Oracle is here to stay, and will be the other 800lb gorilla in the business world (the first being Microsoft).
Posted: June 24, 2009 8:58 PM