More Redmond watching from Oracle
In an
article today, Computer Business Review, comments on Oracle president Charles Phillips’ recent announcement of what he claims to be "a major revamp of our product line coming out over the summer both for BI tools and our OLAP engine." I commented
recently that Oracle is readying itself for Microsoft’s November launch of SQL Server 2005. This announcement only serves to reinforce my view. Microsoft has already shaken up the reporting/business intelligence/analytics market by bundling capabilities for which its competitors have traditionally charged. SQL Server 2005 promises to increase the competitive pressure and Oracle is clearly attempting to pre-empt this with this promise of summer enhancements. If the substance of what Phillips announced have been correctly reported, I think he is over-egging the summer pudding (forgive my
culinary license for want of a metaphor) somewhat in an effort to thwart his Redmond foe. I hardly think that the centralised administration of OLAP engine deployment and a new user interface and wizards for the business intelligence tool constitute “a major revamp”. We’re already well into the summer and this smacks of a hastily put together announcement designed to steal some of Microsoft’s November thunder.
