Matt Asay and Marten Micknos both tweeted about Oracle's ad targeted at Sun customers that ran in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal. It's also on Oracle's Web site:
Source: Oracle
Customers have been leaving Sun and its uncertain future ever since the Oracle acquisition was announced, for the stability of IBM, HP, and Dell. The recent EU decision to continue evaluating the Sun acquisition prolongs the uncertainty surrounding Sun. On the surface, this ad is clearly intended to stop, or at least reduce, this unsettling customer trend.
[ For full coverage of the Oracle-Sun deal, see InfoWorld's special report. ]
Matt points out there is no mention of MySQL in the advertisement. I'll take it one step further and cite no mention of any part of Sun's software division (save for Solaris with its SPARC linkage) -- nothing about Java, GlassFish, MySQL, OpenOffice, Netbeans, R&D investments, or sales support.
This is somewhat understandable. Why would Oracle pledge to "spend more money developing Sun xyz" software product when Oracle already has a competitive product in its existing portfolio? In some cases, Oracle may spend more developing the Sun product. In other cases, Oracle may spend significantly less or even kill the product. But one would still expect a blanket "we're committed to protecting customer investments in Sun software" or something.
I find the timing of this ad surprising. What better way to fan EU fears that Oracle is going to "hurt MySQL and open source choice" than by publishing an ad that completely ignores MySQL and Sun's software portfolio?
Most have speculated that Oracle was really after Sun's software assets and was likely to sell the Sun hardware/systems division after the acquisition was approved. This advertisement would suggest otherwise. But hey, it's an Oracle advertisement. Take it with a grain of salt.
Follow me on Twitter: SavioRodrigues.
p.s.: I should state: "The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions."
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243 Recommendations
Why no mention of MySQL and a half dozen other issues?
Errrrrr, maybe because it is ad in Newspaper with large, readable fonts? Good adverstising addresses a narrowly scoped issue. So all the fuss about no Glassfish, MySQL , etc. (several more complicated issues) is hugely tempest in a teapot. Ad doesn't mention Java either... is that now also suppose to be not strategic to Oracle? That would equally be a suspect assumption.
As far as pundits who proposed Oracle would sell off hardware parts... when is the last time Oracle/Ellison sold off an aquisition. Either going to work or going to Oracle's Warehouse 13. Oracle was already going in the completely opposite direction with Exadata and DB Machine. Why wouldn't Oracle want to sell a top-to-bottom-entire-support-spectrum Oracle solution?
Additionally, it would be bad form to take the issues they are deliberating with the EU folks specifically to a public ad campaign. If, as reported, MySQL is at the core of that then yet another reason to leave it out of the ad. Throwing more posturing into the equation isn't going to get the approval to move quicker. That would be fanning the flames.
What have here is a bunch of folks on the outside fanning flames. They would whether it, MySQL, was in or out of the ad. If MySQL is making money, why would Oracle kill it? Several products/services/licensing will be needed to pay off the acquisition costs.
The root cause of the negative impact here is that the deal is taking too long (especially if factor in the square dancing time Sun did with IBM). This ad serves to buy a bit more time during the waiting room period. That's it.