Oracle History

Some topics from Oracle history are included in separate articles:

• Oracle takeovers
• Oracle financials
• Oracle top managers their earnings
• Employees and Human Resources at Oracle
• Oracle Cloud Business

Key products:

• Oracle Database - a DBMS for the development of which Oracle was created
• Oracle Cloud - Public Cloud
• Oracle Cloud Platform is a scalable application consolidation platform.

2023: Oracle's £100m failed IT project causes Birmingham bankruptcy

In early September 2023, it became known that one of Birmingham the main reasons for bankruptcy, the second largest city in Britain after, London was the failed IT implementation project. software Oracle More. here

2022

Bribery of officials around the world

At the end of September 2022, Oracle was fined $23 million by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). The punishment was imposed for transferring funds to corrupt officials in Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and India.

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), which prohibits American companies from transferring or providing any benefits to individuals to maintain or increase their own business, was allegedly violated by Oracle Corporation when its subsidiaries in Turkey, The UAE and India have set up and used slish funds to bribe foreign officials to attract new clients between 2016 and 2019, the SEC said in a statement. Oracle Corporation was ordered to pay more than $23 million to settle the charges.

In September 2022, it became known about the bribery of officials by Oracle

The SEC ruling alleges that Oracle and its subsidiaries in Turkey and the UAE used these funds to pay for officials' participation in certain technology conferences. According to the ruling, employees of the Turkish branch sometimes used this money to pay for the families of officials to travel to California or accompany them on excursions to international conferences.

The SEC has previously sanctioned Oracle over the creation of unofficial funds. Thus, Oracle settled charges related to the creation of third-party funds by Oracle India for millions of dollars, which posed the risk that these funds could be used for illegal purposes.

The creation of unregistered funds inevitably raises the risk that the funds will be misused, which is what happened at Oracle subsidiaries in Turkey, the UAE and India, according to Charles Kane, head of the SEC's FCPA division. In his opinion, this situation emphasizes how important it is for the corporation to have effective internal accounting control in all aspects of its activities.

Oracle agreed to pay a fine of $15 million, compensation of almost $8 million, and to stop and refrain from violating the FCPA provisions regarding anti-bribery, accounting and internal accounting control, without recognizing or challenging the SEC's findings.

{{quote 'The conduct described by the SEC is contrary to our core values and clear policies, and if we identify such conduct, we will take appropriate action, Oracle spokesman Michael Egbert said in a press release^[1] }}

According to the SEC, in 2019, Oracle sales staff in India used an "excessive discount scheme" under a contract with a "transport company majority owned by the Indian Ministry of Railways."

In January 2019, sales staff tasked with handling the deal, citing intense competition from other original equipment manufacturers, said the deal would be terminated if a 70% discount on software components was not granted.

Because the size of the discount requested was substantial, Oracle required the employee from to France approve the request. However, the deal was approved without the need for a sales employee to provide additional documentary evidence, the SEC said.

A public procurement website of an Indian state-owned enterprise has revealed that Oracle India did not face competition as it authorized the use of Oracle products for the project, the SEC said.

Oracle agreed to pay a fine for bribing foreign customers

The SEC also alleged that one of the sales employees involved in the deal maintained a spreadsheet indicating that the $67,000 was a "buffer" available to potentially make payments to "a specific official of an Indian state-owned enterprise."

In total, about $330,000 was sent to an organization that then transferred money to officials as bribery, and another $62,000 was paid to an organization controlled by the trade workers responsible for the transaction.

Oracle has collected a dossier for 5 billion people and makes billions of dollars from them

On August 24, 2022, it became known about a lawsuit filed in court, according to which Oracle has a digital dossier for 5 billion people around the world and operates a "data market" where it trades in "open and transparent audience data."

The lawsuit alleges that Oracle is not a transparent company and has invaded the privacy of most people on Earth. The lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of California, names three representatives of the group, including Dr. Johnny Ryan, a senior fellow at the Irish Civil Liberties Council (ICCL).

Oracle has collected a dossier for 5 billion people and makes billions of dollars from them

Oracle's Шаблон:Quote 'violated the privacy of billions of people around the world. This is a Fortune 500 company doing the most dangerous operation to track the actions of every person in the world, where they go and what they do, "Dr. Ryan said. According to data to ICCL, Oracle took advantage of careless users Internet to collect a huge data archive that includes intimate details. Billions of personal files in the "Consumer Identity Graph" contain data such as income, interests, email, health care, political views, location history and even details information about online spending and bank account activities. For example, ICCL claims that one database of Oracle included a record of a German man using a prepaid debit card to put €10 on a sporting event.

The document claims Oracle created a "proxy" for sensitive data that other data providers and advertisers agreed not to monitor. For example, a few years ago, Facebook (owned by Meta, the organization is recognized as extremist and banned in the Russian Federation) complicated the targeting of users on the basis of race in certain categories of advertising, but Oracle's Identity Graph helped advertisers achieve the same results as before. It did so without obtaining user consent, and even measures such as blocking third-party cookies are insufficient to stop Oracle's complex data collection.

Oracle is based in the U.S. and has registered as an information broker under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), but that law has a narrow scope and there is no tough consumer privacy law at the federal level. The lawsuit thus relies on a variety of privacy laws, including the Federal Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the California State Constitution, and various competition laws. The plaintiffs are likely to face great difficulties as Oracle has a large staff of qualified lawyers. Oracle has not yet commented on the lawsuit.^[2]

Oracle sued for collecting personal data without consent

On August 25, 2022, it became known that a lawsuit was filed in a district court in California on behalf of three defenders of personal privacy rights. data Two plaintiffs reside in, and USA one in. Plaintiffs Ireland demand, first, that the lawsuit be given class-action status so that other plaintiffs can join it, and second, that they Oracle must stop collecting data and pay compensation for collecting personal data without the owners' consent.

The plaintiffs believe they have evidence that Oracle collected their personal data. The lawsuit alleges that the company violates California laws by collecting and selling personal data and invading privacy. The plaintiffs cite California's constitution, state laws on, federal data protection channel listening law and communications other laws.

In 2020, Oracle had to defend itself against a lawsuit in Holland filed by The Privacy Collective. Although the plaintiffs argued that the company violated the provisions of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the court did not accept the claim, citing the applicants' lack of right to file a similar claim^[3]

Refusal to pay Plexada System Integrators $56 million under a state contract

On June 16, 2022, it was revealed that Nigerian company Plexada System Integrators had sued Oracle for alleged breach of contract and non-payment of millions of dollars owed for helping to execute the Lagos State Government's IT contract. Read more here.

2021

Oracle climbs into Oracle debt to pay for Cerner purchase

In December 2021, leading rating agencies Moody's Investors Service, S&P Global Ratings and Fitch Ratings warned of a possible reduction in Oracle's credit rating due to large debts that the IT company will have to climb into to finance its largest purchase.

On December 20, 2021, Oracle announced the acquisition of the manufacturer software for health care Cerner $28.3 billion, $95 per share of the company being sold. A month before this announcement, Oracle disclosed information according to which the company had $22.8 billion in cash with a net debt of $50.6 billion.

Oracle climbs into Oracle debt to pay for Cerner purchase

Although Oracle did not say how it would pay for the purchase of Cerner, it is obvious that the corporation will have to borrow money, since it does not have enough of its own funds. In addition, Cerner's own debt at the time of the announcement of the transaction was $1.8 billion.

Every year, Oracle will be able to generate free cash flow of $10 billion after paying dividends and including expenses on the transaction at Cerner, according to Moody's analysts. However, it could take two years or more for the corporation to fully offset the initial negative impact of Cerner's purchase on Oracle's credit rating, the report said.

Citi analyst Tyler Radke believes the takeover of Cerner will halt Oracle's active buyback program. In the financial quarter alone, closed at the end of November 2021, the company bought $7 billion worth of securities from investors, and over the past 10 years it has bought almost half of its outstanding shares. Fitch Ratings agrees with this and noted that in the first half of this financial year, Oracle bought back shares for $15 billion.^[4]

US Supreme Court rules in favor of Google in Oracle's Android code lawsuit

The Supreme Court USA in April 2021 ruled in favor of the company Google in a lawsuit with the company over the matter Oracle , software Android which lasted almost 10 years.

Oracle believed that when creating the Android OS, Google partially used code written by Oracle.

Google argued that this is a "common practice in the field of programming," and the code used is not subject to copyright protection, since it is functional.

Oracle's lawsuit against Google was estimated at about $8 billion.

The breakdown of the deal to buy TikTok due to the change of president in the United States

In mid-February 2021, the Chinese company ByteDance that owns TikTok abandoned the deal to sell its business to and USA. Oracle Walmart The deal lost its meaning after Donald Trump leaving the presidency. More. here

2020

Oracle moved headquarters from California to Texas

In mid-December 2020, Oracle announced the transfer of headquarters from California to Texas following Hewlett Packard Enterprise, which announced its intention to move from San Jose to Houston. Oracle has been based in Silicon Valley since its founding in 1977. Oracle has added to the list of tech companies that are fleeing the San Francisco Bay Area for Texas.

Oracle spokeswoman Deborah Hellinger clarified that the company's headquarters moved from its former campus in Redwood Shores, California, to Austin, Texas. Since Oracle began to use a more flexible office policy, the company's employees will not have to move to Texas. Now "many of our employees can choose their own office or continue working from home both full-time and part-time," she said. Thus, the company intends to improve the quality of life of its employees and their commitment to the company.

The tech industry in Austin has a fairly long history: Companies like IBM, Dell Technologies and Samsung have long opened stores here, and Oracle recently built a campus for itself in the heart of the city. In 2020, Dropbox CEO Drew Houston moved here, and Palantir co-founder and venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale intends to transfer his 8VC firm to Austin.

The founder Tesla and CEO SpaceX Elon Musk in December 2020 announced a move from California to Texas, and Tesla itself is building a Cybertruck plant in the Austin area. Oracle's chief technology officer and co-founder Larry Ellison sits on Tesla's board, so Musk and Oracle's near-simultaneous move to Texas looks logical.^[5]

Oracle and Salesforce accused of unauthorized sale of user data

Against the companies Oracle Salesforce and in August, a lawsuit was filed in the district court, in Amsterdam which they are accused of illegally using users' personal data and transferring them to third parties without notification and consent of the users themselves, said "."Businessman

According to the plaintiff - the non-profit organization Privacy Collective - tech giants Oracle and Salesforce collected users' personal data through third-party cookies and then sold it to third parties.

Among the cookie providers, BlueKai and Krux are mentioned, whose programs collect data on users, including on sites such as Amazon, Booking.com, Dropbox, Reddit and Spotify. This data was then used in real-time advertising trades - online auctions.

On them, advertisers, using specialized software, are fighting to ensure that it is their advertisement that is shown to a specific user of the site. At the same time, users themselves do not know anything about this data trade.

According to the plaintiff, this is a direct violation of the General Regulation for the Protection of Personal Data in force in the EU. The amount of the claim exceeds $1 billion, and this is the largest class action lawsuit ever filed in the Netherlands for violating this law. A similar claim will be filed in the coming month at the High Court in London.

2019

Oracle changed its name to avoid paying partner fee

A former Oracle sales representative in Qatar sued the company for $660 thousand in remuneration due to him, but could not take the money because Oracle suddenly changed the name of its legal entity in this country. After that, he could only present a court warrant for the payment of funds to an old legal entity with empty accounts, writes The Register^[6] so as^[7].

Alaa AlNaji began working with Oracle Systems Limited, an Oracle affiliate in Qatar, as a sales representative in May 2013. The cooperation lasted until June 2014. According to the lawsuit that AlNaji subsequently filed against the company, Oracle refused to pay him a commission for sales to the extent indicated in the employment contract. Instead, the company began pushing for a review of the terms of cooperation.

AlNaji refused to accept Oracle's new terms, for which he was fired. He soon took the company to a Qatari court. The proceedings lasted four years. Finally, in January 2018, the court ruled in favor of the plaintiff and ordered Oracle to pay the fee. The company disagreed with such a decision and appealed. However, in March 2019, the Qatari court upheld its decision.

Oracle: We were left without a smartphone market due to theft of Java technologies for Android

In late March 2019 Oracle , she asked USA Google the Supreme Court not to grant an appeal against an earlier judgment, according to which she violated Oracle's copyright when using components from Java operating system Android in. More details. here

Warren Buffett sold all of his shares Oracle

In February 2019, Berkshire HathawayWarren Buffett sold all of its Oracle shares, valued at $2.13 billion. Read more here.

Google: Oracle victory in dispute over Oracle use in Android will kill software development

At the end of January 2019 Google , she appealed to the Supreme Court USA with a statement to reconsider the 9-year trial Oracle on the legality of the use of software interfaces () in API Java . operating system Android Google believes that Oracle's victory will kill the development. ON More. here

2018

Buffett bought 41.4 million shares of Oracle. Share value - $2.1 billion

In the financial statements for the third quarter of 2018, which Berkshire Hathaway published on November 14, it became known about the purchase of 41.4 million shares of Oracle by Warren Buffett. The cost of this share is estimated at $2.1 billion. The size of the percentage share is not specified. Read more here.

How Oracle software is pirated: top managers of an IT company went to prison for 2 years

In early April 2018, a district court in Ohio, United States, sentenced three senior employees of TERiX to prison for organizing a pirate scheme to resell Oracle software products. Another top manager got off with a suspended sentence and a fine.

As follows from the court documents, excerpts from which were published by the Bleeping Computer portal, the founder and CEO of TERiX Bernd D. Appleby, together with three employees of the company, established shell companies Sevanna, Summit and Wex, through which service and server support contracts were concluded with Oracle.^[8]

The court convicted four top managers of TERiX for participating in a pirate scheme in which convicts stole and resold security updates for Oracle products

Under the terms of the agreements, fake companies received login credentials to the Oracle client portal, from where they could download updates for the Solaris OS and patches for other Oracle software products. This software, available only by paid subscription to Oracle customers and authorized partners, is considered intellectual property and is protected by copyright law. However, TERiX resold Oracle updates and patches to their customers.

During the trial, it was found that from 2010 to 2014, fraudsters through shell firms downloaded a total of 2,704 files worth over $10 million from Oracle servers and provided them for more than 500 TERiX customers for a fee.

In an effort to hide the fraudulent scheme and prevent other employees of the company from learning about the origin of Oracle files, top managers of TERiX used the codenames "Boeing," "Tank," "Snow Wight," "James Bond" and "Plan E."

Operating under the guise of sham companies, TERiX, with the help of downloaded updates, Oracle was able to serve its customers without paying the regular commission that Oracle receives from third-party service and support organizations cooperating with it.

However, in the end, the frauds were revealed: Oracle exposed the scammers after one of the top managers made a mistake and downloaded updates under the account of a shell company, but from the TERiX IP address.

In addition to the complaint to the FBI, Oracle filed a civil lawsuit against TERiX, which it won in 2017. The judge banned TERiX from conducting activities related to servicing Oracle products, and also ordered the attackers to compensate for the damage caused in the amount of $57.423 million.

On April 5, 2017, a point was made in a criminal case against high-ranking TERiX employees. The judge imposed the most severe punishment on the organizer of the pirate scheme, 66-year-old Bernd D. Appleby.

As a TERiX executive and principal owner of the company, Appleby was responsible for all aspects of the business. It was he who developed the scheme, which operated for almost 10 years, that he understood and managed all criminal actions. After the fraud was revealed, he instructed other employees of the company to find a way to prevent the disclosure of the crime, "said Benjamin C. Glassman, prosecutor for the southern district of Ohio[9]

The founder and CEO of TERiX will face a fine of $100 thousand and 2 years in prison, after which he will be under supervision for another 2 years.

The second co-owner and COO of TERiX - 52-year-old James A. Olding - was sentenced to a year and 1 day in prison and a fine of $50 thousand. Once released, he will be placed under supervision for three years.

Two more TERiX employees - 58-year-old sales director Lawrence E. Quinn and 47-year-old maintenance director Jason T. Joyce - received lighter sentences. The first will spend 1 day in prison, pay a fine of $5 thousand and will be 2 years under police supervision, and the second will be given a suspended sentence of 24 months and a monetary penalty for the same amount.

Oracle to Trump: Pentagon state contract sharpened for Amazon 

In April 2018, it became known about a conversation between the CEO Oracle Safra Katz and the president USA Donald Trump about a multi-billion dollar cloud contract. Pentagon She complained that the tender was sharpened under. Amazon The head, states who has repeatedly expressed a negative attitude towards, Amazon promised fair bidding. More. here

Oracle chief Safra Katz complains to Trump about dishonest tender for Pentagon cloud contract

Victory over Google in Java trial

USA On March 27, 2018, the Court of  Oracle Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled positive for the proceedings, which accused the company of Google illegal use in the Java API platform. Android 

According to the court's delivery, Google violated Oracle's copyright by preferring to "copy Oracle's product" rather than develop its own application program interfaces or not license them from Oracle.

US court finds Google guilty of Oracle copyright infringement

The decision is final, but court hearings will be held that will determine the amount of payments to Google in favor of Oracle. The latter demanded compensation in the amount of $8.8 billion, while it bought the Java developer - Sun Microsystems - for $7.4 billion. As noted by Bloomberg, the amount of Google payments may be higher than $8.8 billion.

Oracle first filed a Java-related lawsuit against Google in 2010, accusing the opponent of refusing to make deductions due to Oracle. According to Oracle, Google's decision to distribute the Android operating system for free violated Oracle's copyright on part of the Java software, which led to a decrease in the company's revenue.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld Oracle's statement that Java's use in Android does not fall under the fair use category, as this operating system develops for commercial purposes, which are expressed not through the direct sale of a software product, but through control of related services and advertising.

The judge noted that Android brought Google about $42 billion in advertising revenue, so free distribution of Android does not make the use of the Java API non-commercial. Google insisted that the parts of Java that the corporation uses in Android do not fall under copyright laws. ^[10]

2017

UK local authorities face problems financing Oracle software

On December 20, 2017, the company TmaxSoft published findings about the study, according to which a major problem for many local governments Great Britain in was the increase in costs for software Oracle databases, long-term licensing and high-cost audit procedures.

The budget of local councils was reduced as a result of a decrease in the level of funding from government-wide funds. The growing costs of Oracle relational DBMSs licenses and confusing software audit procedures place additional strain on the budgets of local councils, which often lack the finances or staff to monitor compliance with that company's product licensing terms. According to TmaxSoft's conclusion from responses to Freedom of Information requests, Oracle's periodic audit of local councils threatens many of them with fines for violating licensing conditions.

Key findings of the study

• 92% of tips use Oracle database software;
• despite the austerity regime, 32% of those surveyed said they had experienced a 20% increase in Oracle costs over the past two years, 2% said - Oracle costs had risen by more than 100%;
• 20% of British local councils over the past two years have paid Oracle at least £100 thousand, and 2% of councils have these costs exceeded £500 thousand;
• the problem is the need to conclude a long-term licensing agreement - from 20% the license was purchased for more than four years and from 43% - for one to two years;
• 5% of those surveyed have been audited by Oracle over the past year, which across the UK means 21 out of 418 local councils.

Frequent audits conducted by Oracle are certainly of concern to local councils. Of course, the local councils themselves must ensure that the terms of software licensing are met, but given that every year Oracle is audited by 5% of the councils, there is a real risk that some local councils, due to lack of funds, cannot accurately track the implementation of license agreements. As a result, if the audit reveals a violation of the license agreement, then the local council will need to purchase expensive additional licenses from Oracle. Oracle's tough and confusing licensing scheme leads to local councils often not knowing what they are paying Oracle for or how many licenses they actually need. Carl Davies, head of TmaxSoft's UK branch

$275 million tax evasion charge

In April 2017, the amount of taxes that Oracle did not pay to the budget of South Korea became known. The company does not admit its guilt and went to court.

According to the Yonhap news agency, citing knowledgeable sources, the South Korean Federal Tax Service (NTS) accused a local Oracle subsidiary of tax evasion in excess of 300 billion Korean won ($262 million). Business Korea clarifies that we are talking about 314.7 billion won ($274.5 million).

Oracle Logo Outside Company Office in Colorado, USA

Between 2008 and 2014, Oracle earned about 2 trillion won in profits in the South Korean market and transferred this money to the account of the company's American office in the form of royalties for the use of intellectual property. Such transactions, under the terms of the South Korea-U.S. tax agreement, are taxed at 15% of the amount of income being repatriated.

The NTS claims that Oracle, using a scheme with the transfer of funds through the Irish office, avoided paying taxes in favor of South Korea. In April 2016, the company filed a protest against the South Korean tax authority's ruling, but the latter upheld its decision.

In February 2017, Oracle filed an appeal with the Seoul Administrative Court in which it asked for the tax authority's claim to be overturned because the company claimed it had paid taxes under the country's law. To defend its rightness, the IT giant has hired leading South Korean law firm Kim & Jang.

According to a report by the South Korean Trade-Investment Promotion Agency, Ireland has become a tax haven for large international companies thanks to relatively low corporate taxes and various tax incentives. For example, foreign companies can pay taxes at a rate of as little as 6.5% for research and development activities in Ireland^[11]

Launching an accelerator for cloud startups in Israel

On January 16, 2017 Oracle , it launched a cloud startup development program in. Israel American The corporate manufacturer software plans to launch similar projects in other countries.

Oracle has formed an accelerator in Israel for startups developing or using cloud technologies. Start-up companies that become members of the program can expect six months of support from technical and business experts, access to advanced technologies and Oracle customers, partners and investors. The project is being developed under the guidance of a team of Oracle researchers and developers, the news agency reports. Reuters

Oracle sports aerobatic aircraft

The accelerator was created on the basis of a scientific and innovation center, built in 2003 together with the Israeli authorities in order to assist startups in the early stages of their development. A total of 36 companies were based in this center at different times, which accounted for more than $150 million in ROI.

The cloud start-up support pilot program was initially launched in India. In the future, Oracle is going to open a number of similar centers around the world. The corporation did not specify how much is planned to be invested in each such project, and only named the approximate amount of investment - several million dollars for each program.

The next 5-10 years of innovation and growth promise to be driven by new business ideas based on, "said Reggie Bradford, cloud computing senior vice president of product development at Oracle.

According to Thomas Kurian, President of Product Development at Oracle, the company is committed to creating a favorable ecosystem for startups around the world.^[12]

2016: Court orders Oracle to pay HPE $3 billion for abandoning Itanium

On July 1, 2016, it became known about the jury's decision in a US court, according to which Oracle will pay compensation in the amount of $3 billion to Hewlett Packard Enterprise for refusing to support Itanium processors in its products. Oracle announced the upcoming appeal against this decision^[13]

The amount specified corresponds to the HPE request. It includes $1.7 billion in actual lost profits and $1.3 billion in prospective lost profits.

In 2001, Hewlett-Packard, together with Intel, developed Itanium processors for use in servers. Oracle and HP entered into an agreement under which Oracle pledged to release software to run on HP servers that are based on these chips. But in 2011, Oracle stopped releasing this software.

HP has been spooked by a likely decline in interest in its products after Oracle's refusal to support software for its servers and go to rivals. In 2012, the Superior Court of Santa Clara County (California, USA) ordered Oracle to continue releasing the relevant software, in accordance with the contract, but HP stated that it had already suffered damage from the decision and indicated that Oracle did not have a clear promise to continue supporting Itanium after the court order.

Oracle announced verbal agreements on support issues Itanium and the absence of such in terms of long-term support.

By 2011, Oracle had reached a conclusion about the upcoming logical termination of Intel with this line, after which it shifted its focus to the x86 architecture, like Intel.

Oracle representatives called for attention to HPE's use of the ambiguity of the Itanium support clause in Oracle products and a last-minute decision to pay attention to "some new conclusions, even if they are not related to the occurrence of a loss."

Oracle plans to appeal the decisions of 2011 and 2016.

2015

Oracle and Intel Cloud Alliance

At the end of October 2015, it became known about the collaboration between Oracle and Intel in the development of equipment for data centers used in the launch and support of cloud services. This alliance of American companies is aimed at combating one of the leaders in the cloud hardware solutions market - IBM Corporation.

The partnership between Oracle and Intel at the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco (October 25-29, 2015) was announced by the CEOs of these companies Mark Hurd and Brian Krzanich, respectively.

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich speaking at OpenWorld (October 25-29, 2015)

We are talking about the Apollo project, which Oracle and Intel began working on earlier in 2015. IT giants decided to connect their engineers to it to optimize server hardware running Intel processors and memory. The partners intend to develop hardware and configure software for large data centers as part of Oracle's scalable cloud infrastructure, Krzanich said.

The initiators of the Apollo project are going to use the Apollo project to write documentation that will detail new data center architectures and provide instructions with which customers can quickly and easily build data centers based on Oracle and Intel solutions.

Enterprise data centers are in a "colossal transition," Krzanich said, and new technologies developed by Oracle and Intel should help companies understand the growing volume of data coming from a variety of sensors, gauges and customers.

one of the most innovative periods for data centre technology I've ever seen. New developments offer an excellent opportunity for those who implement IT, "said the head of Intel

The Oracle partner tandem was created to combat IBM, which is one of the five largest suppliers of equipment for cloud data centers (data from analysts Synergy Research Group for the second quarter of 2015). Mark Hurd said Oracle and Intel have already been able to convince several thousand customers to abandon IBM infrastructures in favor of Oracle solutions thanks to the latest software.^[14]

Oracle named the main competitors

On October 25, 2015, Larry Ellison named Oracle's main competitors. The company considers fast-growing cloud service providers as such.

During the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco (October 25-29, 2015), Ellison stated that Oracle's main struggle in the market is with Salesforce and. Workday In addition, throughout its presence in the Amazon cloud industry, this online retailer has been putting competitive pressure on Oracle. Microsoft does this often, and - Google sometimes, noted the founder and chairman of the board of directors of Oracle.

Oracle has stopped paying attention to the fight against traditional vendors like SAP and IBM

According to him, traditional IT vendors IBM and SAP, with which Oracle has been fighting for many years, have ceased to worry about the latter, despite their ambitions for cloud projects.

"For our two biggest competitors, with whom we went nostril to nostril in the last two decades - IBM and SAP - we stopped paying any attention. We are quite shocked by this. I can call IBM an outstanding company in history, but they are not in the cloud market. SAP is the largest application manufacturer of all times and nations. But they are also lagging behind as a cloud provider, "Larry Ellison said

He also added that Microsoft is the only traditional competitor to Oracle that has been able to cling to the cloud industry and impose a struggle on three levels of this market (providing hardware and software as services, as well as application development services).

During his speech, Ellison noted that Oracle is ahead of Workday in the number of SaaS clients and is in second place after Salesforce.com. We are talking about 420 thousand customers with whom Oracle works, said Judith Sims, chief marketing officer of the corporation.

Larry Ellison added that about one in five Oracle customers buy the company's software as part of a cloud model, a trend that will grow exponentially in the coming years.^[15]

Ellison: SAP and Salesforce.com pay Oracle a lot

In June 2015, Oracle founder and chairman Larry Ellison announced that the company's main competitors prefer to use Oracle solutions rather than their cloud products, paying it huge sums.

"SAP does not use HANA in its cloud to a large extent. I know this as they still pay us. They paid us again this quarter for the use of Oracle in SAP Concur, Ariba and SuccessFactors (they are subsidiaries of SAP - approx. TAdviser). I don't know what they're using HANA for at all, "Larry Ellison said on a conference call with analysts

Larry Ellison says Oracle makes good money on orders from SAP and Salesforce.com

According to the ex-head of Oracle, the company makes good money on orders from Salesforce.

"They buy Oracle Exadata from us to launch in their data centers. They buy Oracle DBMSs and pay a lot of money for them, "Ellison said

At the same time, he admitted that Oracle lags behind the Salesforce.com in sales of SaaS and PaaS solutions, although it is ahead of the competitor in terms of growth. It will take a little time to overtake Salesforce.com in terms of cloud revenue, an Oracle top manager assured.

It is worth noting that Larry Ellison is known for his statements in which he compares Oracle with competitors, exposing them in a disadvantageous light. During a conversation with analysts, Ellison, in addition to SAP and Salesforce.com, mentioned Workday. Compared to this company, Oracle has a larger volume of cloud business and its growth potential, Ellison said, adding that Oracle has 10 times more deals in the cloud ERP systems than Workday.

As noted by Oracle CEO Safra Catz, in the fourth fiscal quarter, closed on May 31, 2015, the company recorded a more than 200 percent increase in the volume of orders for the supply of SaaS and PaaS solutions, earning $426 million from them against the projected $300 million. This rise of the vendor in the cloud market turned out to be the largest in the history of the company, Katz emphasized.^[16]

Accusations of unfair competition in South Korea

On April 28, 2015, it became known that the South Korean antimonopoly authority was investigating Oracle, suspecting the company of dishonest conduct of trading practices.

According to the agency Reuters , citing Hwang Won-chul, director of the South Korean Fair to trade Trade Commission (FTC), which has started checking Oracle's business DBMS Oracle Database 12c software , the American corporation sells something else in the country complete with product support services. Thus, Oracle customers, including many business and public sector representatives, have no choice but to enjoy technical support from the company.^[17]

Such a sales model can be seen as limiting competition and trying to take control of the market, which prevents the sale of goods and services of other companies competing with Oracle (for example, a South Korean company TmaxSoft (DBMS Tibero), and). the AmericanMicrosoft IBM

Oracle could be fined 3% of revenue for unfair competition

As noted in the publication of the Yonhap edition of April 28, 2015, in recent years, Oracle's share in the South Korean DBMS market has grown from 40% to 60%. In 2014, the company earned 817 billion ($763 million) in the country, where approximately 60% of revenue came from licensing and the provision of software support services sold earlier.^[18]

"We have not yet decided whether there will be any sanctions against Oracle," said Hwang Won-chul, adding that the final decision on this issue will be made in June or July 2015.

The FTC says that if Oracle is found guilty, it faces a fine of 3% of revenue. At the end of fiscal year 2014, the company earned $38.3 billion, which is 3% more than a year earlier.

Oracle is not the first American company whose activities have come under the scrutiny of the authorities. In February 2015, the FTC reported on an antitrust investigation into Qualcomm. The semiconductor manufacturer is accused of abusing its dominant positions in the chip market: Qualcomm sold licenses for its chips in the form of "packages," which, in addition to the technology vendors needed, included unnecessary ones. For this violation, the company has already paid a fine of $1 billion in China.

Oracle shareholders ask for more power

In January 2015, it became known that two large European pension funds, which are among Oracle shareholders, are calling on the company's management to expand the rights of securities holders. This request was far from the first.

The heads of the Dutch pension fund PGGM N.V and the British Railways Pension Trustee Company sent a letter to Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison asking the founder of the company to allow shareholders to appoint their own candidates to the board of directors, participate in the appointment of payments to top managers and simplify the overall structure of interaction between shareholders with Oracle management.

Oracle shareholders ask for more power

The funds above are pushing for a meeting with Oracle directors to discuss the Oracle. At the same time, according to Bloomberg, the company's shareholders have been unsuccessfully trying to sit down with executives since 2011.^[19]

As of the beginning of 2015, PGGM and Railways Pension Trustee own just over 7 million shares (approximately 0.16% of the total) worth about $310 million. The largest shareholder with a 25 percent stake is Larry Ellison.

In September 2014, PGGM and four other institutional investors sent a resolution to the board asking that shareholders be allowed to independently appoint at least a quarter of the board members. This resolution did not find approval.

In a 2013 shareholder letter, PGGM funds, California State Teachers Retirement System and Railway Pension Investments outlined the problem of excessively high compensation payments to top executives and pushed for the re-election of 11 directors. In particular, shareholders expressed dissatisfaction with the size of Larry Ellison's compensation package, which is one of the largest in the United States. In 2014, the founder of Oracle received $67 million from the company.

2014

SAP agreed to pay compensation of $359 million in favor of Oracle

In November 2014, Oracle and SAP agreed to settle a legal conflict over software rights. SAP will pay $359 million to Oracle, plus $120 million for legal costs and the removal of a number of claims.

Opening of the Big Data Expertise Center in Barcelona

On November 27, 2014, Oracle announced the creation of the Big Data Expertise Center in Barcelona.

Among the tasks of the Center is to provide big data services to customers throughout Europe. The center draws on the experience gained during the first phase of the strategic project to implement a new big data infrastructure at CaixaBank, launched in December 2013 and developed in conjunction with Oracle.

The center will provide educational services to new Big Data specialists from Oracle, CaixaBank and other private and government organizations through cooperation with universities and companies, and the development of training courses.

Together with Oracle Product Development, the Center will create new Big Data solutions, including for specific industries, including the financial sector. The Center plans to accumulate and disseminate the accumulated knowledge, experience for the further development of Big Data technologies and solutions in Europe.

The center in Barcelona will cooperate with universities, government and non-profit organizations, private companies, to promote big data technology and contribute to their development.

2013

400 thousand corporate clients in 145 countries

As of the end of 2013, according to Oracle, its customers are more than 400 thousand enterprises from various industries in more than 145 countries around the world, including all 100 Fortune 100 companies. About 290 thousand Oracle customers are represented by medium and small businesses.

One of the most famous Oracle products - a database - is used by about 310 thousand customers. About 115 thousand customers use intermediate ON Oracle, 85 thousand - the company's business applications and 2.7 thousand customers - its software and hardware complexes.

End of war with Salesforce and product integration

In July 2013 , Larry Ellison, head of Oracle, and head of Salesforce.com Marc Benioff laid down their spears and, after many years of mutual scandals, attacks and critics of competitors, agreed on long-term cooperation for a period of 9 years, which involves the mutual integration of vendor technologies.

According to the agreement, Salesforce.com will standardize its solutions for the operating system, Linux intermediate ON to Java and server platform, and Exadata will also use cloud services Fusion human capital management (), HCM as well as financial services. Oracle, in turn, integrates these applications with services Salesforce.com.

Ellison believes that such cooperation will benefit primarily from the clients of both companies. Vendors will work closely on security issues and, as mentioned above, standardize mutual solutions in such a way as to ensure their maximum mutual integration. Such pre-integration work will allow customers to reduce the cost of implementing solutions by half, said Larry Ellison.

Outside experts are questioning Oracle's claims. For example, Gartner analyst Michael Maoz believes that the integration of Oracle and Salesforce.com products will only play into the hands of a small number of users. According to him, this is about 4-6% of the total user base of both companies. Moreover, the largest customers will be in the winning position.

In addition, as of July 2013, Oracle and Salesforce.com did not name any exact date for the introduction of integrated services to the market. Interestingly, Oracle has signed similar cooperation agreements with other players, including Microsoft and NetSuite.

The agreement with Microsoft, in particular, deals with mutual support for Oracle, Java and Microsoft Azure DBMS, as well as support for Oracle virtualization software Microsoft Hyper-V. The agreement with NetSuite provides for the mutual integration of the Oracle HCM cloud service and the NetSuite cloud ERP service.

Conflict with CedarCrestone

Former Oracle partner CedarCrestone accused the vendor of "illegal and systematic attacks" on third-party firms that support the corporation's customers, as well as the de facto monopolization of the Oracle solution support market.

Oracle revoked CedarCrestone's partner license in 2012 and even filed a lawsuit accusing the latter of providing support services illegally.

The claims against CedarCrestone were similar to those made by Oracle against SAP's former TomorrowNow division and Rimini Street, which also offered alternative support services for Oracle systems.

CedarCrestone's business was based on the implementation of Oracle applications, as well as a partial update of the ones already installed software in accordance with tax and regulatory changes. The latter service was very important for customers who did not want to pay for vendor support, through which Apregard systems are possible, but still needed to bring the systems in line with the legislative field.

In its lawsuit, Oracle accused CedarCreston of using official updates as a "starting point," and of deceiving users by saying it developed them independently and that using them did not constitute a violation of intellectual property rights. CedarCrestone allegedly also used unauthorized copies of Oracle software, according to the lawsuit, which is being considered by the District Court of the Northern District of California, USA.

In January 2013, CedarCrestone responded to the allegations, assuring that it was not engaged in theft of other people's programs. Moreover, the company believes that Oracle did not have the right to break off partnerships with it. According to representatives of a consulting company, Oracle achieved a virtual "monopoly" in the solution support market, hindering the development of the free market.

2012: Court: Oracle shareholders have power to charge Ellison with fraud

In 2012, a Delaware County court ruled that Oracle shareholders have the right to file a lawsuit against the actions of company chief Larry Ellison, whom they suspect of investing improperly to enrich themselves personally.

The subject of the dispute was the 2011 purchase of Pillar Data systems, which is 55% owned by Larry Ellison.

2011: Discussion of the sale of the domain Sun.com

In 2010, when Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems for $7.4 billion, the company inherited many customers, personnel and technologies. She also got one of the best domain names on the Internet - Sun.com. In 2011, when Oracle was actively decommissioning this site, according to experts, it could sell a domain name and get a million or more.

According to Jeff Kupietzky, CEO of Oversee.net, a domain named Sun.com can cost from $1 million to $2 million.

Paul Nicks, director of the registrar's post-sales services group GoDaddy , said:

"The Sun.com name is attractive in that it can be used in multiple ways. Many are interested: companies generating electricity from the energy of the sun, companies with the word "sun" in the name, investors in domain names or those who are looking for a trading interest in using the history of this name. "

According to his estimates, being put up for auction, this name can bring from $800 thousand to $900 thousand.

Kemer Thomson, Oracle's senior product development manager, announced in a blog post that Oracle will decommission the Sun.com on June 1, 2011 and move the rest of the relevant content to the site Oracle.com.

Already in March 2011, Sun.com browser requests are redirected to the Oracle home page, but many personal blogs and technical pages in the Sun domain are still available. Third-party sites in the archive of outdated materials will probably not be transferred to Oracle.com.

The decommissioning of the site causes nostalgia among experienced computer specialists. One blogger from the UK says that in 1995 it was one of the first and most popular sites for him. Registered on March 19, 1986, Sun.com is one of the eleven oldest "dot-coms" still in operation. Oddly enough, Oracle now owns the third oldest domain name - Think.com. At the dawn of dot-coms on the Internet, in the late 1980s, Sun Microsystems recaptured it from Intel and AT & T.

While Oracle does not answer questions about what it plans to do with Sun.com, it has many options.

If Larry Ellison is worried about evaluating analysts, then the company, in the language of domain name resellers, can "park" the domain name. That is, to conclude a contract with an independent service provider to fill the site with advertising. Internet monitoring service Alexa estimates traffic on the Sun.com is still significant: this name is in 2277 place among the most popular names on the Internet.

Oracle may leave the domain for future name branding. Or hold it only as an asset that will sell later. "A lot of people see domain names as a serious investment opportunity," Kupiecki said. The name "can be saved for future sale pending value growth."

Jason Miner, senior vice president of sales and business development at NameMedia, which operates in the domain name market, noted that this is a phenomenal domain name.

"When you have a single-word domain name like this, it has multiple meanings," and can be used in any industry, he said.

Miner estimates the possible sale of Sun.com at $1 million, if not more. But this result will not be unique: in 2010, the Zip.com domain was sold for more than $1 million, Dating.com for $1.75 million, and Т-Shirts.com for $1.26 million.

Any of the scenarios will depend on Oracle re-registering the domain name. The last name verification period expires on March 20, 2012. If Oracle for some reason forgets to do this, then anyone can pick it up for about $10.

As of March 2018, the sun.com domain was still redirected to oracle.com.

2010

Court on charges of overpricing government contracts in the United States

In June 2010, the US Department of Justice sued the US corporation Oracle, accusing it of inflating the prices of government contracts by "tens of millions of dollars," according to The Register. In fact, the Ministry of Justice joins another similar lawsuit, which was filed by former Oracle employee Paul Frascella. According to him, Oracle used selective tactics when setting prices for its decisions - large discounts that were offered to corporate clients should also be offered to the public sector, but this was not done.

According to documents filed in the District Court of the Eastern District of Virginia, under the terms of the General Services Administration (GSA), which oversees the implementation of the state budget, public sector solution providers are required to "offer the best prices for the most privileged customers."

Having discovered violations of the terms of the contract concluded with the GSA, in 2007 Frascella filed a lawsuit against his employer, accusing him of violating the law "On falsification of claims" adopted in 1986. It allows employees of organizations to report on the facts of deception states committed by the companies in which they work.

Frascella joined Oracle in 1997 as a contract specialist. He was informed that according to the law, Oracle is obliged to conclude contracts with the authorities on the most favorable terms for the latter. However, over time, schemes were developed for commercial customers to sell products at better prices. One of these schemes involved the use of a third party - a reseller who became an intermediary between Oracle and the state customer.

In some other cases, Oracle provided its customers with knowingly false information about the value of the contract, hiding important expense figures, and deliberately misinformed sales employees. Court documents mention the name of Oracle's vice president of global operations, Ellen Eder, who is allegedly at the center of these frauds.

According to experts, such a development of events can result in serious problems for Oracle. In particular, she may face serious fines - from $5 thousand to $11 thousand for each fact of deception. Moreover, the company that committed such violations may completely lose the opportunity to participate in tenders for public procurement. As a result, the lost profit will be several times more than those losses that will be due to penalties.

Previously, the company has already been involved in such cases. In October 2006, the corporation agreed to pay the state $98.5 million for violations committed by its company PeopleSoft, which was also accused of providing incorrect information about the cost of decisions to the public sector.

Dell and HP begin selling servers with Oracle Solaris, Oracle Enterprise Linux, and Oracle VM

Oracle said Dell and HP will sell x86 servers with Oracle Solaris, Oracle Enterprise Linux and Oracle VM pre-installed.

Oracle Solaris - An operating system acquired as a result of the takeover of Sun Microsystems. Oracle Enterprise Linux is a modification of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux OS with support from Oracle. Oracle VM is not so much an operating system in the usual sense of the word as an Xen hypervisor virtualization platform that supports Linux, Solaris and Windows. However, Oracle's strategy for the further development of the Solaris OS remains not fully clarified: if Sun Microsystems made an unequivocal bet on the development of Solaris as an open source system, then Oracle obviously abandoned this strategy.

Ex-head of HP Mark Hurd appointed president of Oracle

In September 2010, the former head of Hewlett-Packard, Mark Hurd, was admitted to the board of directors of Oracle and appointed president of this company. Read more here.

Oracle pays $46M kickback penalty

Under an out-of-court agreement with the American authorities, Oracle will pay $46 million in compensation for damage caused to the state due to illegal payments to system integrators, who recommended that government agencies purchase Sun Microsystems products for this. In 2010, Oracle and Sun merged into one company.^[20]

Six other companies entered into similar agreements with the authorities, including IBM (it will pay $3 million), PriceWaterhouseCoopers ($2.3 million) and Computer Sciences ($1.4 million). In 2007, former employees of Accenture and PriceWaterhouseCoopers filed a lawsuit describing a "kickback" scheme in government contracts involving dozens of large IT companies and system integrators. According to the law, individuals can file such claims on behalf of the state, for which they can be paid a reward in the form of a share of the amount collected. The U.S. Department of Justice joined the lawsuit. The agreement will also resolve a conflict between Sun, the US General Services Administration and the US Postal Service over incorrect prices in reseller contracts.

2007-2012: Oracle v. SAP Litigation

In 2007 Oracle , he filed a lawsuit in a federal court in Oakland County against a subsidiary of a German IT concern, SAP TomorrowNow which SAP he bought in 2005 for 10 million. dollars

TomorrowNow employees illegally accessed Oracle's internal corporate sites, downloaded from there and then used closed documentation, the plaintiffs said. Later, allegations of copyright infringement were added to these claims.

For two years, SAP has been trying to prove the absence of a crime in the actions of TomorrowNow employees.

In 2010, a jury found Oracle entitled to $1.3 billion in damages for copyright infringement. This happened after SAP admitted his guilt in the lawsuit.

However, Oracle did not receive full compensation because a federal county judge reduced it to $272 million.

At the same time, SAP, as part of the settlement agreement, in 2010 already paid $120 million in legal costs.

On August 2, 2012, SAP and Oracle agreed to pay a German concern to an American company $306 million in compensation for a lawsuit filed in 2007. This decision was caused by the protracted terms of the proceedings and the unwillingness of companies to get involved in a new lawsuit on the amount of payments.

Thus, the total amount of SAP payments to Oracle could amount to $426 million, including $120 million in legal costs. The agreement between the two companies requires approval by a federal court in Oakland.

2006: Running Linux Native Operating System

January 31, 2006 in connection with the takeover of Siebel Systems, Inc. Oracle Corporation was merged into a holding company with Ozark Holding Inc. and renamed Oracle Systems Corporation, while Ozark Holding Inc. was renamed Oracle Corporation.

Oracle entered the operating systems market with the first introduction of the Oracle Enterprise Linux operating system, based on the source code of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (the CentOS project, Red Flag Linux, etc.).

1995: Merger into a single company

On June 1, 1995, Oracle Systems Corporation and Oracle Corporation merged under the common name Oracle Corporation.

1994: First official representative in Russia

The successes of the first Oracle distributor led to Russia in 1994 and the first official representative of the company - Andreas Hart. At the same time, Oracle clients in Russia became such powerful structures as the FSB, the Cabinet of Ministers, Mosprivatization, the Ministry of Railways, RAO UES, etc.

For more information on business in Russia and other CIS countries, see Oracle Russia and CIS.

1991: Oracle on the brink of bankruptcy

In 1990, when the company received the status of a leading software manufacturer, the first failures appeared. Managers accustomed to stable growth failed to predict the consequences of the emergence of new players in the market, and for the first time in Oracle's history, its expenses exceeded revenues. Things only got worse in 1991. Oracle sales fell 80% and the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. Larry Ellison replaced most executives and managers with the best in the business, and it worked. Thanks to a competent marketing policy and the release of powerful new databases, Oracle managed to return to the previous level. Its products were used by banks, airlines, car companies and supermarkets. And with the proliferation of e-commerce, Oracle's revenues have increased many times over.

1986: Carrying out an IPO

On March 12, 1986, an initial public offering of Oracle Corporation shares took place.

1982: Renamed Oracle Systems

On October 29, 1982, the company was renamed Oracle Systems.

1979: Release of Oracle 2 DBMS

In June 1979, Ellison's first system, Oracle 2, appeared. In marketing terms, Ellison turned out to be more talented than Bill Gates. Unlike the founder of Microsoft, who called the first version of Windows - Windows 1.0, he showed marketing ingenuity, so the second version of the product was immediately released. This was supposed to make it clear to customers that the system was reliable and even passed the time test. Ellison can be understood: he did not have the approval from IBM that Gates had. Even on the contrary: Ellison creating a product that could become a competitor to IBM solutions.

For more information, see Oracle Database.

1977: Foundation of the company to develop relational DBMSs

The Oracle story began in, Silicon Valley California. In USA 1977, a young programmer Larry Ellison dropped out of Yale to start his own business. Larry Ellison, who then had only 1,200 at his disposal, dollars persuaded Bob Mayner and Ed Oates, his former colleagues, to create their own company. Prior to that, all three developed CIA a project by order called... Oracle.

On June 16, 1977, Ed Oates, Bob Mayner and Larry Ellison in California (USA) founded Software Development Laboratories, soon renamed first with Relational Software Inc. Young programmers, whose total business investment amounted to $2 thousand, began developing a database management system (DMS) built on the principles of relational algebra.

Later, all complex DBMSs became relational, but when in 1970 an employee of the IBM research laboratory Edgar Codd proposed a new method for organizing databases, many specialists had doubts that he would even justify himself. Therefore, until the mid-70s, information in databases was distributed according to an old hierarchical, or "tree," principle, which is still used to present files in a PC.

IBM, however, financed the creation of a prototype system on the principles proposed by Code, and in 1976 the System R project appeared, which inspired the future founders of Oracle to create relational DBMSs.

Notes