Oracle is offering free business applications - through Oracle Business Indicators - for the Apple iPhone (I hear a lot of cheering out there). iPhone users can now view and interact with Oracle Business Intelligence Applications that include financial, human resources, supply chain and customer relationship management analytics, as well as analytical alerts generated by Oracle Delivers, an integrated component of OBIEE. User configuration options allow users to select the relevant indicators to their role and preferences for browsing.
Just be aware that Oracle has modified the license agreement as well. When you update or install the Business Indicators app on your iPhone, you’ll get a message stating:
“The licensing requirements for Oracle Business Indicators have been updated such that Oracle Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition Plus is required. Oracle Business Intelligence Applications is an optional licensing component.”
Despite the financial crisis, Oracle has exceeded expectations. Regardless of its recent positive earnings release - they have predicted a significant slowdown for next quarter in software license sales, which some analysts believe may be an indication of a slowdown in IT altogether.
With Oracle Open World and a flurry of new product announcements, the company is hoping that its broad product lines will keep the company’s momentum moving forward in the impending bad economy.
With such a wide range of products that virtually every business needs, Oracle isn’t too worried about the future, despite the markets and competing vendors. Belt tightening will likely be with non-mission critical software applications, but renewals of existing contracts will continue to take place as companies depend on them to do business.
Similar to investing in the financial markets, mitigating software licensing risk is about gathering information. Here are 5 quick guidelines that will help:
1- Create a repository where vendor information is stored. Make certain that this includes a comprehensive database of what software is currently installed and where; how many competitive vendors are currently being used and all the paper work.
2- Identify any unsupported software. Costs for emergency updates or repairs to unsupported software can be very high.
3- If a new multi-core based licensing is available (such as with Oracle), you can re-evaluate your IT environment and consider consolidating existing installations to better align licensing with applications.
4- Align your IT procurement to coincide with software adoption cycles. By determining existing software needs with the roll out of new applications throughout the enterprise, the purchase can be aligned with usage; thereby reducing risk of over or under licensing.
5- Self audit twice a year to ensure that licensing remains current and compliant.
We get this question a lot. In most cases, companies may user Oracle Full use licenses in a development environment by downloading Oracle products from the Oracle Technology Network (OTN). Users must agree to the Oracle Technology Network Developer License Terms, which gives licensing rights to the single user to use the application(s) in a development environment only. The OTN Development License also limits the use of the product to only one person and limits installation of the product to one server. In addition, the Oracle products cannot be used for any internal data processing operations or for any commercial or production functions. So, Oracle licensing is pretty clear in a development environment - one person, one server and for development environment only. If you have a multiple user development environment (and most organizations do), then a license is required.
With the financial crisis (or should I say crises) happening faster than a bunch of falling dominoes, Larry Ellison is unconcerned about how this will affect Oracle and technology spending (in general). The fact that Oracle’s “exposure to banking customers is in the low-single digits” with an even lower exposure to US banks could be the reason Larry has kept on smiling. In fact, revenues grew 18% compared to last year’s 4th quarter.
Here are some quick self audit tips should you ever be faced with an Oracleaudit:
1. Proof of ownership- Collect all software licensing agreements (SLAs), invoices, and other renewal or procurement documentation. This paper trail will help in the audit process.
2. Measure your Oracle licensing usage- try to account for how often each Oracle product is used - including both typical usage and maximum usage - to ensure that the proper licenses have been purchased based on the amount of access.
3. Licensing is not “black & white” - Be awarethat situations vary from company to company and so will what Oracle constitutes as being in compliance. Be cognizant that the following scenarios below each has its own licensing challenges:
a. Internet and extranet access
b. Transfers of data to and from your system
c. Backup, standup and failover
d. Test servers
e. Virtualized environment
4. Understand that any modification can impact licensing. Any modifications made within Oracle’s e-Business suite applications - such as to forms and reports - need to be accounted for as it is considered an alteration of the license usage.
5. Compare. If you have an SLA that was signed several years ago (or even a year ago), be sure that it still supports your current business needs. In a dynamic business environment, needs change so quickly that licensing does not always keep up. One example is the mobile workforce. Many organizations have not taken this new method of working into account when reviewing their Oracle licensing and have often been cited as being non-compliant.
As with any audit - whether it’s the IRS or Oracle - it’s best to be prepared. The first step should always be a self audit (Remember, knowledge is power). As with many organizations, it’s not surprising to discover that they are NOT in compliance with their Oracle software licensing -the most common reason is over-licensing or under-licensing. If your Oracle licensing is not in compliance, be sure to resolve the issues quickly, develop a plan for dealing with future licensing usage and be open with Oracle (or any software vendor) about your findings and how you plan to deal with it moving forward. In our experience, Oracle will work with clients during these audits. Majority of the time, non compliance is due to lack of a software asset management program and changes in software licensing rules.
