VENDORiQ: Oracle-Google Cloud Partnership: Friends with Benefits

Why It’s Important

Oracle’s OCI service has partly succeeded in attracting customers who remain committed to Oracle data platforms and solutions. The OCI provides a smooth migration from on-premises Oracle solutions to fully managed cloud services.

However, Oracle’s solution is often (and not always accurately) perceived as costly and less flexible than rival hyperscale clouds: Microsoft Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud Platform. Of these three hyperscale clouds, Google provides the most cost-effective run times and offers a far more open environment, with many technology partners, than Oracle.  

As a result, IBRS believes the Oracle-Google partnership provides organisations looking to migrate their existing Oracle estates into the cloud as a good option with open opportunities for integrating Oracle into the myriad of AI, data analytics and integration services within the Google platform with compelling cost advantages.

In short, the new offering allows for Oracle-based application migrations and modernisation.

The initial offering is available across 11 Google Cloud regions and has the underappreciated benefit of not incurring cross-cloud data transfer charges. Additionally, the initiative caters to existing Oracle customers by allowing the transfer of Oracle licences and support rewards. The partnership’s specific targeting of multiple industries broadens its impact potential, enabling specialised application deployments tailored to sector-specific needs.

Who is Impacted?

• Cloud architects: Need to design robust multi-cloud architectures that optimise the interconnected services from both OCI and Google Cloud.
• IT infrastructure managers: Responsible for deploying and managing databases and applications across the new combined infrastructure.
• Data analysts: Data analysts will benefit from enhanced tools and AI capabilities to drive data-driven decision-making and innovation on top of legacy applications built on Oracle solutions. 

What’s Next?

• Evaluate current Oracle cloud migration strategies and identify potential benefits from the Oracle-Google Cloud partnership.
• Plan migrations carefully, leveraging tools like Oracle Zero-Downtime Migration to minimise disruption.
• Train teams on this partnership’s new tools. This is particularly important, given that many experts with deep Oracle skills have proven to be skittish about moving workloads to cloud platforms of which they have little knowledge. The result is that the decision on where to migrate legacy cloud workloads generally falls to Azure, leaving more cost-effective options (such as Google Cloud)  out of the running.  This is not to say that Google is always the best option, but training is required to remove the potential of ‘resume-driven decision-making’.

Related IBRS Advisory

• Oracle Introduces Oracle Database@Azure with Microsoft
• Oracle Recognised as a Certified Strategic Hosting Provider
• Google Aims at Oracle Cloud with Bare Metal Solution in Sydney