Oracle does not cope with support

Clients of Oracle have a choice this year: carry out updating or pay more for support. Though after acquisition of products usually Oracle provides five years of primary support, time of expanded support which is more expensive comes after that, but gives less advantages.

According to information on the website of Oracle, for users PeopleSoft of FMS/ESA 8.8 as for ELS 8.81 and HRMS 8.8, expanded support will stop until the end of this year. And for JD Edwards EnterpriseOne 8:12 a.m. and JD Edwards CRM Mobile Sales 8.12 expanded support will come next month. Oracle E-Business Suite 12 and Oracle Siebel CRM 8.0.x will enter this mode of service in January, 2012.

Referring to global economic downturn, Oracle made concessions to users in determination of time frames of support. In 2009 she announced that charges for expanded support of some releases within the first year can be temporarily cancelled.

According to the press secretary, Oracle is not going to grant any delays for these releases. However since then the company announced failures from charges for platformno-dependent expanded support of databases 10gR2 and also from charges for initial year of expanded support of PeopleSoft Enterprise 9. According to the official site of the company, a number of the modules PeopleSoft Enterprise 9 should enter model of expanded support this year.

Clients get advantages of primary support in the mode of expanded support which lasts three years, excepting availability of certification to new versions of applications of third-party developers. After expanded support there is supporting. It is available for an indefinite term, but it does not include key services, such as updates of new taxes and regulations, new critical patches and certification both Oracle, and third-party producers.

Restrictions of terms of support became a hot topic of discussion among members of the group of users of applications of Oracle (Oracle Applications Users Group - OAUG) and, certainly, still will be at a conference of the Collaborate 11 group in April, John Schmitz working in consulting council of customers of this organization told.

Users "are strongly anxious" concerning cost and complexity of updates, Schmitz who is also chapter of the E-Business Suite project in IT department of the Wisconsin Madison university says: "I think, they will be glad to any help what will be able to be received".

Recently Oracle made "big step forward" in this direction, having issued several detailed guides which will help clients to pass through specific processes of updating, Schmitz told. The Wisconsin Madison university performs updating of E-Business Suite now and finds that the relevant document will be serious help. "We use it as the only source of information search in the project, - Schmitz told. - Nevertheless, the command still estimates whether need will close adhere to the methodology stated in the management".

Meanwhile, end of terms of support of Oracle allows the third-party companies, such as Rimini Street, to hurry towards to users with the offer of own support. David Rowe, the senior vice president of the company for the general marketing and cooperation said: "We provide an alternative for carrying out updating".

Providing continued technical support, normative and tax updates, Rimini Street states that her clients will save not less than 50% on support. According to Schmitz, apparently, the whole industry was connected to upgrade case, considering breaks in support from Oracle.

While heads of Oracle react to actions of OAUG, according to Schmitz, the group hopes for closer cooperation with other organizations, such as IOUG – independent group of users of Oracle - (Independent Oracle Users Group) and Quest for formation of the expanded front in questions of support.