WebProNews

Category: CloudPlatformPro

  • SymphonyAI Taps Oracle for Cloud Services

    SymphonyAI Taps Oracle for Cloud Services

    Oracle has scored another win, partnering with SymphonyAI to provide it with Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) services.

    SymphonyAI is a leading artificial intelligence firm, creating applications that leverage AI to help businesses gain insights and educate their decision-making process. According to Zacks Equity Research, the company plans to use OCI services to further help it deliver real-time insights, combined with the cost-efficiencies of cloud computing.

    The partnership is the latest in a long line of Oracle successes that have seen the company gain significant ground in the cloud market. While not in the top three, Oracle has increasingly been turning heads and gaining recognition for the value proposition it offers.

    In fact, the company appears poised to be a big winner in the cloud industry in 2023, and this latest partnership is one more step toward that goal.

  • Rackspace Founder: ‘They’re On a Trajectory of Death’

    Rackspace Founder: ‘They’re On a Trajectory of Death’

    Rackspace has had a tough couple of months, leading the company’s founder to predict “they’re on a trajectory of death.”

    Rackspace Hosted Exchange experienced a security issue in December resulting in the company shutting the service down and recommending users switch to Microsoft 365. Weeks later, the situation was still not resolved, leaving Hosted Exchange offline.

    According to the San Antonio Express-News, founder Richard Yoo says the company’s reputation “is eroding rapidly.”

    “This is the beginning of the end,” Yoo said. “It’s already just a midsize business in San Antonio. This is not a company that’s on a trajectory of growth. They’re on a trajectory of death. It will not be around.”

    Yoo believes much of the problem is the company’s current generation of managers and board members, none of whom are the kind of tech-oriented leaders the company once had. As a result, the company is now led by individuals “who don’t have any connection with the product.” He added that there’s “no culture.”

    Yoo’s condemnation is certainly not going to help Rackspace as the company tries to recover from its recent issues. Only time will tell, however, if Yoo’s long-term assessment is correct.

  • Microsoft Acquires Fungible to Improve Its Data Centers

    Microsoft Acquires Fungible to Improve Its Data Centers

    Microsoft has announced its acquisition of Fungible, a company that produces data processing units (DPUs) used in data centers.

    Microsoft Azure is the second-largest cloud computing platform behind AWS. Microsoft clearly wants to improve its data center offerings, and sees Fungible as a way to achieve that.

    “Fungible’s technologies help enable high-performance, scalable, disaggregated, scaled-out datacenter infrastructure with reliability and security,” writes Girish Bablani, Corporate Vice President, Azure Core.

    “The Fungible team will join Microsoft’s datacenter infrastructure engineering teams and will focus on delivering multiple DPU solutions, network innovation and hardware systems advancements.”

    Microsoft sees Fungible as a long-term investment that will help it differentiate its offerings.

    “Today’s announcement further signals Microsoft’s commitment to long-term differentiated investments in our datacenter infrastructure, which enhances our broad range of technologies and offerings including offloading, improving latency, increasing datacenter server density, optimizing energy efficiency and reducing costs,” Bablani adds.

    No financial terms of the acquisition were revealed.

  • Tableau Bears the Brunt of Salesforce Layoffs & Reorganization

    Tableau Bears the Brunt of Salesforce Layoffs & Reorganization

    Salesforce may have spent $15.7 billion to acquire Tableau, but the division is bearing the brunt of Saleforce’s recent issues.

    Salesforce announced Wednesday that it would be laying off roughly 10% of its workforce. According to Bloomberg, however, Tableau has seen a larger percentage of its workforce laid off than the rest of Salesforce.

    The gutting of Tableau is being seen as a lack of confidence in the division, given Tableau’s performance issues.

    “It makes a lot of sense to me that Tableau would have a disproportionate contribution to this layoff,” John DiFucci, of Guggenheim Research, told Bloomberg. “That company was not growing new business when they bought it, and they paid a lot.”

    The cuts come on the heels of most of Tableau’s top leadership exiting the company. The latest departure was CEO Mark Nelson in December and, according to Bloomberg, the majority of top execs that were with the company when Salesforce acquired it have left.

    With the economy in a downturn, it seems that Tableau doesn’t measure up to Salesforce’s current needs.

  • Oracle Poised to Be Big Cloud Winner in 2023

    Oracle Poised to Be Big Cloud Winner in 2023

    Oracle is poised to be a big winner in the cloud industry in 2023, thanks to a combination of factors, including its “modest valuation.”

    Oracle is not one of the cloud market’s Big Three — AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud — but has nonetheless made significant headway in the market, including scoring major contracts and poaching customers from its larger rivals.

    According to Seeking Alpha, Monness, Crespi, Hardt analyst Brian White said the company was “well positioned” going into 2023. In particular, the company was a “steady hand in a treacherous market,” seeing less of a stock decline than many in the tech industry.

    “In our view, no company is immune to an economic downturn; however, we believe the tailwind of the Oracle Cloud and the stock’s modest valuation provide some downside protection,” White wrote to clients.

    Oracle’s stature was also boosted by its inclusion in the $9 billion multi-vendor Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability (JWCC), the successor to the abandoned Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) contact.

    White called it a “prestigious win” and says it shows just how much progress Oracle has made in the cloud market.

  • Amazon Is Shutting Down the Consumer Version of Wickr

    Amazon Is Shutting Down the Consumer Version of Wickr

    Amazon has announced it is shutting down Wickr Me, the consumer version of its ultra-secure messaging app.

    Amazon acquired Wickr in June 2021. Wickr is a messaging app that offers end-to-end encryption and does not require a phone number or other identifying information to register. Its security and privacy make it a popular option among government agencies, such as US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP), but also among criminals.

    With mounting criticism over how Wickr is used, Amazon has decided to suspend new signups for Wickr Me and ultimately shut the service down altogether:

    At Wickr, we’ve served a diverse set of customers that range from the boardroom to the battlefield. Since AWS acquired Wickr in 2021, we’ve listened closely to our customers to better understand their requirements for end-to-end encryption. After careful consideration, we will be concentrating Wickr’s focus on securing our business and public sector customers’ data and communications with AWS Wickr and Wickr Enterprise, and have decided to discontinue our consumer product, Wickr Me. As a result, we will not accept user registrations for Wickr Me after December 31, 2022, and will discontinue Wickr Me on December 31, 2023.

  • Alibaba Reshuffles Execs, CEO Takes Over Cloud Unit

    Alibaba Reshuffles Execs, CEO Takes Over Cloud Unit

    Alibaba has undergone a major reorganization of its executives, with the CEO taking over as head of the company’s cloud unit.

    Unlike many companies, Alibaba has a system in place to rotate its executives, courtesy of former CEO Jack Ma. The system is designed to keep Alibaba nimble and prevent it from stagnating in a fast-moving industry.

    As part of its latest shuffle, CEO Daniel Zhang “will assume the role of acting President of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence and responsibility for the communication and collaboration platform DingTalk.”

    The previous head of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence, Jeff Zhang, will focus on his role head of Alibaba DAMO Academy, as well as T-Head, Alibaba’s proprietary chip development team. He will also continue leading the company’s Internet of Things (IoT) efforts.

    “Over the past four years, Jeff has led the Alibaba Cloud Intelligence team to deliver outstanding results in technological innovation and industry influence,” said Daniel in an internal email to staff.

    “As the country enters a new stage of living with Covid and policymakers have given direction to the future development of the platform economy, we are more confident than ever that continued development is the key to solving the challenges we face today,” Daniel continued in the email.

  • IBM Stock Was the Real Winner Among Big Tech in 2022

    IBM Stock Was the Real Winner Among Big Tech in 2022

    IBM may fly under radar, compared to its Big Tech rivals, but Big Blue was the real winner in 2022.

    2022 was not a good year for the tech industry. Despite flying high during the pandemic, an economic downturn has taken its toll, resulting in slower growth and mass layoffs.

    According to CNBC, however, IBM is the exception to the rule. The company is one of only two among companies valued at $50 billion or more whose stock is up over the course of 2022. The other one is VMware, although its stock is only up because of its deal to be purchased by Broadcom.

    Read more: IBM Beats Expectations on Strong Hybrid Cloud Results

    IBM’s stock, which is up 6%, appears to be benefiting from the company’s long-term strategy which has reassured investors. The company has reinvented itself as a hybrid cloud provider and formed close ties with its larger cloud rivals, such as Microsoft and AWS.

    As a result of the company’s strategy, Bernstein Research analysts say IBM is “trading well above its historical range.”

    “Given its defensive characteristics and historical performance, we believe that IBM is likely to fare well if we continue to have pressured markets, and likely to lag major indices if we enter a recovery period,” they continued.

    IBM is once again proving its ability to adapt to changing circumstances and stay relevant when many younger, more “nimble” companies struggle to keep up.

  • EU Commission Investigating Broadcom’s VMware Deal

    EU Commission Investigating Broadcom’s VMware Deal

    Broadcom’s acquisition of VMware hit another snag with the EU opening an investigation into the proposed deal.

    Broadcom and VMware reached a $61 billion deal in May 2022 that would see Broadcom purchase the virtualization company. The deal immediately sparked concern for VMware’s future, given Broadcom’s reputation for slashing expenses and forcing its subsidiaries to run incredibly lean operations.

    In November 2022, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced an investigation into the deal, and now the EU Commission has announced its own investigation.

    “Broadcom, a major supplier of hardware components, is acquiring VMware, a key server virtualisation software provider,” said Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President in charge of competition policy. “Our initial investigation has shown that it is essential for hardware components in servers to interoperate with VMware’s software. We are concerned that after the merger, Broadcom could prevent its hardware rivals to interoperate with VMware’s server virtualisation software. This would lead to higher prices, lower quality and less innovation for customers and consumers.

    In particular, the Commission is worried that Broadcom may scale back some of the services that VMware offers to third-party companies, choosing to bundle them with its own hardware exclusively.

    Given the scrutiny tech acquisition have been under of late, the likelihood of Broadcom’s deal moving forward in the face of two separate investigations is certainly in question.

  • AWS Wins $723 Billion Contract to Provide Cloud Services to US Navy

    AWS Wins $723 Billion Contract to Provide Cloud Services to US Navy

    AWS has scored a big win, securing a cloud contract with the US Navy worth some $723,878,930 over five years.

    The Department of Defense has been working to modernize its computing infrastructure, migrating computer operations to the cloud. The Pentagon recently awarded its $10 billion Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability (JWCC) contract to AWS, Microsoft, Google, and Oracle.

    The US Navy has now awarded AWS a cloud contract, worth more than $723 million, from December 2022 to December 2028.

    Per the agreement, the funds will not be dispersed in one lump-sum, at the time of the blanket purchase agreement (BPA), but will be allocated as orders are fulfilled.

    This BPA will not obligate funds at the time of award. Funds will be obligated as task orders are issued using a variety of funding types, including operation and maintenance (Navy) funds; other procurement (Navy) funds; and working capital (Navy) funds.

    The contract is a big win for AWS and should help the company continue its reputation as the leading cloud provider for government and military organizations.

  • Google Expands Access to End-to-End Encryption in Gmail

    Google Expands Access to End-to-End Encryption in Gmail

    Google is rolling out end-to-end encryption (E2EE) for Gmail, expanding access to the beta for eligible customers.

    E2EE is an important security feature that ensures even Google can’t read a person’s email when it resides on their servers. Google announced the change in a blog post:

    We’re expanding customer access to client-side encryption in Gmail on the web. Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Education Plus, and Education Standard customers are eligible to apply for the beta until January 20th, 2023.

    Using client-side encryption in Gmail ensures sensitive data in the email body and attachments are indecipherable to Google servers. Customers retain control over encryption keys and the identity service to access those keys.

    E2EE is the gold standard for encryption and security and its nice to see Google expanding access to it.

  • Microsoft and London Stock Exchange Group Form Strategic Partnership

    Microsoft and London Stock Exchange Group Form Strategic Partnership

    Microsoft will purchase a 4% equity stake in the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), forming a 10-year cloud partnership.

    The financial sector is an increasingly important one for cloud providers, with all of the major cloud providers vying for partnerships in the industry. Microsoft has scored a major one, forming a 10-year strategic partnership with the LSEG, one that will see the Redmond-based company take a 4% equity stake.

    In exchange, the LSEG will migrate its data to Microsoft Azure and will use Microsoft Azure, AI, and Microsoft Teams to build its next-generation solutions. The deal will also see Scott Guthrie, Microsoft’s Executive Vice President, Cloud and AI Group, appointed as a non-executive director of LSEG.

    “This strategic partnership is a significant milestone on LSEG’s journey towards becoming the leading global financial markets infrastructure and data business, and will transform the experience for our customers,” said David Schwimmer, CEO of LSEG.

    “Bringing together our leading data sets, analytics, and global customer base with Microsoft’s comprehensive and trusted cloud services and global reach creates attractive revenue growth opportunities for both companies.

    “We are delighted to welcome Microsoft as a shareholder. We believe our partnership with Microsoft will transform the way our customers discover, analyse, and trade securities around the world, and create substantial value over time. We look forward to delivering on that potential.”

    The two companies will also explore other opportunities to integrate digital market infrastructure with cloud technology.

    “Advances in the cloud and AI will fundamentally transform how financial institutions research, interact, and transact across asset classes, and adapt to changing market conditions,” said Satya Nadella, Microsoft CEO.

    “Our partnership will bring together the industry leadership of the London Stock Exchange Group with the trust and breadth of the Microsoft Cloud — spanning Azure, AI, and Teams — to build next-generation services that will empower our customers to generate business insights, automate complex and time-consuming processes, and ultimately, do more with less.”

  • Pentagon Awards Cloud Contracts to Multiple Vendors for JEDI Successor (Updated)

    Pentagon Awards Cloud Contracts to Multiple Vendors for JEDI Successor (Updated)

    The Pentagon has awarded contracts to multiple cloud vendors as it seeks to replace the defunct JEDI contract.

    The Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) contact was the Pentagon’s attempt to modernize its IT operations and migrate to the cloud. AWS was largely seen as the frontrunner until Microsoft was awarded the entire $10 billion contract. AWS responded by suing the Pentagon relentlessly until the DoD canceled the contract in favor of the $9 billion multi-vendor Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability (JWCC).

    “The purpose of this contract is to provide the Department of Defense with enterprise-wide, globally available cloud services across all security domains and classification levels, from the strategic level to the tactical edge,” the DoD writes in the award notices. “The Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability will allow mission owners to acquire authorized commercial cloud offerings directly from the Cloud Service Providers contract awardees. Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability is a multiple award contract.”

    The multi-vendor contract was awarded to AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft, and Oracle. Rather than define the share of the contract each company will receive, each company is part of the same $9 billion pool and will receive funds as their services are needed.

    “No funds will be obligated at the time of award; funds will be obligated on individual orders as they are issued,” the DoD continues.

    Only time will tell if all four cloud players, especially AWS, accept the terms or resort to lawsuits in an effort to secure more favorable terms.

    Update: Amazon has reached out to WPN with the following statement:

    “We are honored to have been selected for the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract and look forward to continuing our support for the Department of Defense. From the enterprise to the tactical edge, we are ready to deliver industry-leading cloud services to enable the DoD to achieve its critical mission.”

  • Rackspace Hosted Exchange Hit by ‘Security Incident’

    Rackspace Hosted Exchange Hit by ‘Security Incident’

    Rackspace is dealing with a “security incident” involving its Hosted Exchange service, prompting the company to shut the service down.

    Rackspace first became aware of the issue on Friday, December 2. The company acknowledged the issue on its incident report page:

    On Friday, Dec 2, 2022, we became aware of an issue impacting our Hosted Exchange environment. We proactively powered down and disconnected the Hosted Exchange environment while we triaged to understand the extent and the severity of the impact. After further analysis, we have determined that this is a security incident.

    The company updated its report Sunday, saying it was working on the problem but customers should considering using Microsoft 365 in the meantime:

    We continue to make progress in addressing the incident. The availability of your service and security of your data is of high importance. We have committed extensive internal resources and engaged world-class external expertise in our efforts to minimize negative impacts to customers. We will continue to report our progress and update you as we have more information that we can share.

    In order to best protect the environment, this will continue to be an extended outage of Hosted Exchange. At this time, moving to Microsoft 365 is the best solution for customers, and we highly encourage affected customers to move to this platform. Since our last update, we have been able to successfully restore email services to thousands of customers on Microsoft 365.

  • Microsoft CEO Bullish on Asian Data Center Market

    Microsoft CEO Bullish on Asian Data Center Market

    Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is bullish on the Asian data center market, including China and India, at a time when trade tensions are ramping up.

    Microsoft operates the second-largest cloud platform and, as such, operates data centers around the world. As one of the world’s largest growth markets, Asia represents tremendous opportunity for the company.

    “Absolutely. We’re very, very bullish about what’s happening in Asia,” Satya Nadella, said in an interview with CNBC’s Tanvir Gill.

    Nadella singled out two countries as especially important to the company’s future: China and India.

    “We’re absolutely committed to all of these countries and in China too,” Nadella said. “Today, we primarily work to support multinational companies that operate in China and multinational companies out of China.”

    Similarly, while India is important to the company’s future, Microsoft sees significant changes to the market.

    “Microsoft’s presence in India was about mostly multinational companies operating in India. But for now, it’s completely changed,” he said.

    “It’s the reverse where these companies who are innovating in India, whether it’s the big large conglomerates, or the new startups, are all using [artificial intelligence] cloud technology to be able to innovate and create services that are obviously popular in India and elsewhere,” he added.

    In all, Nadella said Microsoft plans on investing in at least 11 different regions.

  • AWS Unveils ‘AWS Digital Sovereignty Pledge’

    AWS Unveils ‘AWS Digital Sovereignty Pledge’

    AWS is unveiling its latest initiative designed to help it remain the cloud leader: the AWS Digital Sovereignty Pledge.

    Digital sovereignty is an increasingly important aspect of cloud computing, as countries and jurisdictions endeavor to legislate privacy, security, and other online concerns. AWS has always strongly supported digital sovereignty, being the first major cloud provider to give customers the ability to control where their data was hosted, as well as how and where it moved.

    The company is doubling down on that track record with its AWS Digital Sovereignty Pledge, giving customers the most powerful tools available for managing digital sovereignty.

    “Our approach to delivering on this pledge is to continue to make the AWS Cloud sovereign-by-design—as it has been from day one,” writes Matt Garman, Senior Vice President of AWS Sales, Marketing and Global Services. “Early in our history, we received a lot of input from customers in industries like financial services and healthcare—customers who are among the most security- and data privacy-conscious organizations in the world—about what data protection features and controls they would need to use the cloud.”

    The company is applying this “sovereign-by-design” approach in several key areas:

    • Control over data location
    • Verifiable data access control
    • Everything, everywhere encryption
    • Cloud resilience

    “At AWS, earning customer trust is the foundation of our business. We understand that protecting customer data is key to achieving this,” Garman continues. “We also know that trust must continue to be earned through transparency. We are transparent about how our services process and transfer data. We will continue to challenge requests for customer data from law enforcement and government agencies. We provide guidance, compliance evidence, and contractual commitments so that our customers can use AWS services to meet compliance and regulatory requirements. We commit to continuing to provide the transparency and business flexibility needed to meet evolving privacy and sovereignty laws.”

  • Zoom Faces Pressures as Stock Crashes and Growth Slows

    Zoom Faces Pressures as Stock Crashes and Growth Slows

    Zoom has come a long way since its heyday during the pandemic, with its stock down 90% and challenging growth prospects ahead.

    Zoom quickly became the poster child for videoconferencing during the pandemic, as businesses, schools, churches, and families turned to the platform to stay in touch. As things have returned to normal, however, the company has struggled to maintain its growth and fend off larger rivals.

    The company’s stock is now down 90% over its pandemic peak. What’s more, growth prospects are far slimmer moving forward, with Slack, Microsoft Teams, and others posing more challenges to its core business. Zoom is trying to address this by rolling out additional applications and services, such as Zoom Mail and Zoom Calendar.

    Even with the pivot, however, analysts believe the company still has a long road ahead of it before it can return to the type of growth investors have become accustomed to.

    “Zoom has a fundamental flaw – it has needed to spend heavily to keep hold of market share. Spending to cling onto, rather than grow, market share is never a good place to be and was a sign of trouble ahead,” said Hargreaves Lansdown equity analyst Sophie Lund-Yates, according to Reuters.

    “The game is not over for them but without acquisitions this is a multi-year path to returning to higher growth,” said Needham & Co analyst Ryan Koontz.

  • France Shoots Down Free Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace in School

    France Shoots Down Free Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace in School

    France has shot down the possibility of schools using free versions of Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace.

    Schools around the world rely on Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, since both productivity options provide commercial-grade features for free, especially for schools. As part of the EU, France is concerned the productivity suites are not compatible with EU privacy laws and run afoul of French procurement laws, since there is no payment exchanged.

    “Free service offers are therefore, in principle, excluded from the scope of public procurement,” the Ministry of National Education statement says, according to The Register.

    Moving to the paid versions of both productivity suites only solves one potential problem, namely the procurement issue, with data privacy still being a major sticking point.

    The EU has been cracking down on the use of US-based cloud services that store user data within the US. Because of the vast surveillance programs US agencies engage in, the EU does not deem US-based data storage as a safe option for its citizens.

  • Microsoft and Nvidia Partner to Build Cloud-Based Supercomputer

    Microsoft and Nvidia Partner to Build Cloud-Based Supercomputer

    Microsoft and Nvidia are teaming up to build a cloud-based supercomputer with a focus on artificial intelligence (AI).

    Nvidia chips are staples in AI development, with GPUs offering a number of performance benefits over traditional CPUs. Microsoft and Nvidia are collaborating to combine Nvidia’s GPUs with Microsoft’s Azure cloud computing platform.

    The companies say the result of the collaboration will be one of the most powerful cloud-based AI supercomputers in the world. In addition, as part of the collaboration, Nvidia will use Azure virtual machine instances to further AI development.

    “AI technology advances as well as industry adoption are accelerating. The breakthrough of foundation models has triggered a tidal wave of research, fostered new startups and enabled new enterprise applications,” said Manuvir Das, vice president of enterprise computing at NVIDIA. “Our collaboration with Microsoft will provide researchers and companies with state-of-the-art AI infrastructure and software to capitalize on the transformative power of AI.”

    “AI is fueling the next wave of automation across enterprises and industrial computing, enabling organizations to do more with less as they navigate economic uncertainties,” said Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of the Cloud + AI Group at Microsoft. “Our collaboration with NVIDIA unlocks the world’s most scalable supercomputer platform, which delivers state-of-the-art AI capabilities for every enterprise on Microsoft Azure.”

  • Microsoft and Lockheed Martin Collaborate on Classified Cloud Tech for DOD

    Microsoft and Lockheed Martin Collaborate on Classified Cloud Tech for DOD

    Microsoft and Lockheed Martin are collaborating to deliver classified cloud services and advanced tech for the Department of Defense (DOD).

    The Pentagon has been working to modernize its tech infrastructure and speed up cloud adoption. The DOD has already had its share of false starts, but is now turning to Microsoft and Lockheed Martin to help it with cloud technologies, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and more.

    The relationship makes Lockheed Martin the first non-government organization to independently operate within Microsoft Azure Government Secret cloud.

    “Through this historic agreement, Lockheed Martin and Microsoft are blazing a new path in classified cloud, artificial intelligence, and 5G.MIL® capabilities for the Department of Defense,” said Yvonne Hodge, senior vice president, Enterprise Business and Digital Transformation, and chief information officer, Lockheed Martin. “We are creating faster, safer, and more affordable 21st Century Security solutions that infuse immersive experiences and other advanced commercial technologies into the most capable defense systems. We are confident this unrivaled combination of capabilities will help keep our customers ahead of new threats and challenges.”

    “Our national security leaders need an unassailable information advantage, which is why we’re bringing the power of the hyperscale cloud to accelerate their national security missions,” said Jason Zander, executive vice president, Strategic Missions and Technologies, Microsoft. “In partnership with Lockheed Martin, we’re demonstrating how the defense industrial base can bring classified data into the cloud securely while bringing advanced 5G connectivity, critical data processing and analysis, and immersive experiences to the edge to support decision- making where it’s needed, when it’s needed. Lockheed Martin is a valued partner in this effort, and we’ll continue to innovate and explore the art of the possible to support national security.”

    The collaboration will take advantage of Microsoft’s unique solution for air-gapped cloud deployment, an important factor in maintaining the necessary security.

    Lockheed Martin is the first defense industrial base member to use Microsoft’s newest National Industrial Security Program (NISP) framework for air-gapped clouds after a year-long pilot. Work on developing the classified and unclassified cloud environments is already underway, with expectations for the project to be operational in 2023.

  • Oracle Has a ‘Cloud-First’ Problem As Rivals Threaten Its Database Dominance

    Oracle Has a ‘Cloud-First’ Problem As Rivals Threaten Its Database Dominance

    Oracle may be the undisputed king of the database market, but cloud-first rivals are threatening that dominance with cheaper, more flexible options.

    Oracle has long been the dominant player in the database market. Even as the cloud has grown in importance, Oracle has managed to carve out a meaningful share of the market, thanks in large part to the strength of its database platform. Many customers see it as a full turn-key solution, combining the cloud and database solutions necessary. In spite of that, according to a report by Bloomberg, Oracle’s database dominance may be under threat from cloud-first rivals.

    Bloomberg cites the example of Shutterfly, which recently made the decision to move its database to the cloud. Despite relying on Oracle for years, the company decided to go in a different direction with the transition.

    Read more: Larry Ellison Touts Oracle Cloud’s Reliability in Wake of AWS Outage

    “The amount of time and energy that was consumed purely running just the plumbing was immense,” Chief Technology Officer Moudy Elbayadi said in an interview. A review of the existing options on the market led Shutterfly to conclude that Oracle’s solutions didn’t “fit our desires to have that level of openness and flexibility,” Elbayadi added.

    Unfortunately for Oracle, Shutterfly isn’t an isolated example. JPMorgan, Nasdaq Inc, JetBlue Airways Corp, and Automatic Data Process Inc are among the list of companies transitioning to non-Oracle options.

    “We have actually quite rapidly been reducing our Oracle footprint,” said Nikolai Larbalestier, Nasdaq’s senior vice president of cloud strategy and enterprise architecture. “There are plenty of good alternatives today.”

    Part of the problem stems from the complexity involved in running Oracle’s database and the cost to the client company of doing so. Mythical Games CEO John Linden emphasized the issue, despite his firm being valued at $1.2 billion.

    “Oracle hits us up every week,” he said. But “we’d have to have a massive team in place to run it appropriately.”

    See also: Google, Microsoft, and Oracle Had the Most Vulnerabilities in Early 2021

    Just as significant, Oracle’s tools seem to be developing a reputation for not being up to par with the latest developments, making the prospect of working with them unappealing to many developers.

    “I can’t even hire people if I told them that we majorly use Oracle,” Yao Morin, chief data officer at JLL Technologies, told Bloomberg. “People are yearning for better tools.”

    To be clear, Oracle is still the company to beat in the database market, especially among companies that want on-premise database solutions. Nonetheless, the company clearly has some significant areas it needs to improve on if it wants to remain relevant in the coming years. Otherwise, it may find itself in the same situation as IBM when personal computers replaced mainframes — the undisputed leader of a niche market.