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Oracle To Buy Cloud-Software Provider NetSuite For $9.3 Billion (bloomberg.com)

Oracle announced Thursday that it has agreed to buy NetSuite for $9.3 billion, in a move to bolster its cloud-computing offerings as it races to catch up to rivals. Both companies provide applications for running a business called enterprise-resource-planning software. Bloomberg reports: Oracle, which sells software to big corporations, has been trying to shift more sales to cloud-based products increasingly demanded by its customers. New cloud services made up about 8 percent of the company's total sales during its fiscal fourth-quarter. Buying NetSuite -- whose products include customer relationship management software -- will help Oracle compete against the likes of Salesforce.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. "Oracle and NetSuite cloud applications are complementary, and will coexist in the marketplace forever," said Oracle co-Chief Executive Officer Mark Hurd in a statement Thursday. "We intend to invest heavily in both products -- engineering and distribution."

32 comments

  1. MILLENNIAL SNOWFLAKES SHOULD BE FIRED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    If Oracle wants to make a profit, they'll immediately fire all of the millennials. A profitable business requires people to work, and millennials don't like that sort of thing. To a millennial, telling them to work is a form of bullying. Millennial snowflakes should be fired and replaced with actual workers.

    1. Re: MILLENNIAL SNOWFLAKES SHOULD BE FIRED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I agree, millennials are fucking lazy. They don't deserve to have jobs. Baby boomers are the best employees and millennials are the worst.

    2. Re: MILLENNIAL SNOWFLAKES SHOULD BE FIRED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But waaah, waaah, waaah, the millennial snowflakes want playful workdays. Never mind that they should be working instead of playing but they're fucking lazy. Get the work done, get promoted, earn your vacation, then you can play. But the lazy millennials won't do that because it requires work.

    3. Re: MILLENNIAL SNOWFLAKES SHOULD BE FIRED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Trying to get a millennial to work is like debating an empty chair.

    4. Re: MILLENNIAL SNOWFLAKES SHOULD BE FIRED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Millennial snowflakes will cause the cloud bubble to burst and that $9.3 billion will be wasted. If they worked harder, the cloud business would be more successful. But millennials are so incredibly lazy.

  2. "forever" ! hubris much? by sittingnut · · Score: 1

    "... coexist in the marketplace forever".
    when people use words like "most popular for all time" https://apple.slashdot.org/sto... , "best", "forever " for their products, in markets that is inherently changing and dynamic, they either don't know what they are talking about or are placing dishonest hype above truth.
    in either case, customers should be beware of them and their hyped products, just for using that language.

  3. Not Surprising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Netsuite already had financial ties to Larry Ellison, and it's a huge piece of shit like everything else Oracle sells.

    1. Re: Not Surprising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What accounting software do you use?

  4. Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Cloud software is bullshit.

    Also, 9.3 billion nothings is nothing. The US is broke. Ready for the bank runs?

    1. Re:Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      There is no future in cloud software. There is no such thing as a cloud, it means somebody else's computer. What use is it to run your software on somebody else's computer? This sounds like it was a poor idea in the first place, but with all the spying by Microsoft and Google for the American Government coming out now it seems very stupid in coming days.

    2. Re:Short Oracle then by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      Cloud software is bullshit.

      Perhaps, but being bullshit hasn't stopped a lot of products from selling. Rationality and sales are often not in alignment.

    3. Re:Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no future in cloud software. There is no such thing as a cloud, it means somebody else's computer. What use is it to run your software on somebody else's computer? This sounds like it was a poor idea in the first place, but with all the spying by Microsoft and Google for the American Government coming out now it seems very stupid in coming days.

      I say we call such computers "mainframes".

    4. Re: Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well the advantage is you don't have to upgrade your accounting software or monitor your accounting software. There is value to "it just works."
      Anonymous but I am a Netsuite employee and stockholder.

    5. Re:Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The US government alone has over $100 trillion in assets. In what way is that broke?

    6. Re:Short Oracle then by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The advantage is it allows small to mid sized firms the ability to access and make use of advanced tools without the requirement of investing in a proper data center and support team to run these tools. Cloud can be good. True SaaS ERP options like PLEX can be a bit better... but lowering the barrier of entry which Netsuite does... it's a game changer.

      The accountants will also talk about stuff like treating the service as an expense verses the capital expenditures to invest in buying the software.

  5. Usabilty & functionality by Big+Hairy+Ian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Does this mean that Net Suites usability & functionality are going to be downgraded to the banging the rocks together level of Oracles other offerings?

    --

    Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.

    1. Re:Usabilty & functionality by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Maybe not considering NetSuite was co-founded by Larry Ellison in 1998 as NetLedger. Ellison sits on the board and owns 40%, which means he will net about $3.5 billion from the deal. Evan Goldberg is the other NetSuite co-founder and an Oracle alum who thought up the idea of doing CRM over the Internet while in a meeting at Oracle. Also in this meeting was Marc Benioff. Ellison thought it would be better to do financials before adding customer relations and Goldberg agreed, with Ellison funding it out of his personal ventures company. Benioff left Oracle and started SalesForce.com in order to go straight to CRM. Ellison offered to fund his company too, but there was a feud brewing between the two and Benioff kicked Ellison off the SalesForce board and went his own way.

  6. 9.3 billion by fustakrakich · · Score: 0

    Unicorns are reproducing like bunny rabbits. This can't be for real. Watching the markets is going to be more exciting than the election. Who will benefit the most when the balloon pops?

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    1. Re:9.3 billion by NotInHere · · Score: 1

      Who will benefit the most when the balloon pops?

      The vultures, as in patent trolls. Nobody else will really benefit. The way you can benefit is to cash out when its still possible, then buy things that get undervalued as a result of the shock when the bubble bursts.

    2. Re:9.3 billion by fustakrakich · · Score: 2

      :-) I noticed the pump and dump market trolls don't want to see their game exposed.

      The vultures, as in patent trolls. Nobody else will really benefit.

      Yeah, that's a given. I was kinda wondering which party is being set up as the pansy on Black Tuesday.

      The way you can benefit is to cash out when its still possible...

      Probably you can stay in it until around mid September, August for the really paranoid... Buy back in January, after the dust settles a bit, depending who wins.

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  7. Salesforce is an Oracle customer by trybywrench · · Score: 2

    Salesforce's backend is Oracle, I wonder how that relationship works out. I bet Salesforce is one of their larger accounts, it must be awkward at times "thanks for all the license fees but, yeah, we're going to compete with you in the CRM and PAAS space". Salesforce is very very wide and deep, they've grown so far beyond where they started, I'd say they're more of an ERM and process automation tool than a sales tool these days.

    --
    I came to the datacenter drunk with a fake ID, don't you want to be just like me?
    1. Re:Salesforce is an Oracle customer by bazorg · · Score: 1

      it's all weird and incestuous :)

      Salesforce partnered up with Microsoft, probably to run a lot of their stuff on Azure. I mean, the Microsoft Dynamics family is probably smaller than SFDC, but they are still competitors.
      One day we'll probably find out that Azure runs on the Amazon cloud and Google is hosted in a farm of MacMinis from a basement in Cupertino.

    2. Re:Salesforce is an Oracle customer by SQLGuru · · Score: 1

      I guess all of their other CRM products/platforms weren't very good (i.e. Seibel and others)......or maybe it's because Oracle already ran those into the ground and needed to buy some more customers.

  8. Oracle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oracle, where great software goes to die.

  9. Thought they were already owned b Oracle. by GrBear · · Score: 3, Informative

    When we bought into NetSuite 8 years back, we were told they were owned by Oracle.

    I wonder if they got sold, and then now being bought back.

    Honestly though, NetSuite's service has been getting worse and worse every update. For the price they charge (not to mention nickle and dime you for most feature), who could not think they were already owned by Oracle.

    1. Re:Thought they were already owned b Oracle. by Dan+B. · · Score: 1

      From what I understood NetSuite is half owned by Larry (as the Ultimate Controlling Entity), not Oracle directly. It would appear that he's just shifting the ownership from personal control to corporate control, and paying a handsome sum in the process

      --
      Dan. -- So what if it's spelt wrong, nobody's perfect
  10. Solid business plan by tyggna · · Score: 1

    Oracle buys more intellectual property so they can attempt to generate more revenue via lawsuits rather than by doing anything useful

  11. I was told they were already 20% owned by Oracle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That was about a year ago, when I was interviewing for a DBA job with them.

    I was also told that their DB is rife with triggers, which would give any DBA the shivers.

  12. Suck to be a Netsuite user now by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Now Oracle will be able ot make the licensing so complicated, that every Netsuite user will be in breachof thier fully licensed product and get shaken down for being unlicensed.

  13. To the Cloud!!!! by erp_consultant · · Score: 2

    Oracle is all in on this cloud stuff. They were late to the cloud game and are now playing catch up to Salesforce and Workday. So now Oracle (and SAP as well) are snapping up cloud based products. It's the flavor of the month.

    What Oracle has figured out is that it is actually more profitable to sell SAAS software than traditional on premise software. With on premise software you have to support lots of different databases and middle ware and OS's. That makes your development and testing exponentially more difficult and expensive. With SAAS you only have to support one stack - yours.

    Customers give up a lot of control for the convenience of SAAS based products. And the dirty little secret is that SAAS actually costs you more money in the long run. This is why Oracle is so eager to jump on the cloud bandwagon. It's not about doing what their customers want - it's about making more money. On a conference call about 3 months ago Ellison came right out and said that cloud is more profitable.

    Think of it like buying vs leasing a car. Leasing gives you convenience but every study I have read says that buying the car is cheaper in the long run. Eventually customers will catch on to this and cloud will vaporize. But until then there is money to be made and made it shall be.

  14. another buy, another problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Every time they buy something, they wrap the service/software in the corporate bulls hit packaging and the average middle manager think that since they heard the name "oracle" before, the product must be good. Usually is a product that either is not ready or was, but on the process of changing the logo, the broke a lot of things. I try hard to stay away from all the oracle's crap.