WebProNews

Tag: Oracle

  • Employees Would Forgo $30,000 Raise to Work From Home

    Employees Would Forgo $30,000 Raise to Work From Home

    A new survey has qualified just how much employees want to continue working from home (WFM), to the tune of $30,000.

    As restrictions lift and companies begin opening their doors, many employees are faced with the prospect of going back into the office for the first time in more than a year. While many companies are working on permanent remote or hybrid options, some are insisting on a complete return to in-office normality.

    According to a new survey by Blind, an anonymous network of professionals, a Goldman Sachs professional posed the question: “Would you rather make $30k more switching to a new job that requires you to work in the office, or would you rather keep your current salary but WFH anywhere after covid?”

    An average of 64% of professionals indicated they would prefer WFM, although the number for some specific companies was much higher. For example, 100% of Zillow, 70% of T-Mobile, 89% of Twitter, 71% of Walmart, 69% of Apple, 76% of Salesforce and 73% of Oracle employees would all choose WFM. In fact, Cisco, JPMorgan Chase and Qualcomm were the only companies that fell below the 50% mark.

    The survey is just the latest, and most striking, indication of just how popular WFH really is.

  • Microsoft Announces Preview Version of OpenJDK Java Distribution

    Microsoft Announces Preview Version of OpenJDK Java Distribution

    Microsoft has announced a preview build of its OpenJDK Java distribution.

    It’s been a bad week for Oracle. First, the company lost its decade-long battle with Google over Android and its use of Java code. Now the company has a major new competitor to contend with, as Microsoft is making progress on its plans for its own OpenJDK Java distribution.

    Microsoft’s distribution has already passed several significant milestones in its development, which the company touted in a blog post.

    The Microsoft Build of OpenJDK binaries for Java 11 are based on OpenJDK source code, following the same build scripts used by the Eclipse Adoptium project and tested against the Eclipse Adoptium Quality Assurance suite (including OpenJDK project tests). Our binaries for Java 11 have passed the Java Technical Compatibility Kit (TCK) for Java 11, which is used to verify compatibility with the Java 11 specification. The Microsoft Build of OpenJDK is a simple drop-in replacement for any other OpenJDK distribution available in the Java ecosystem.

    The Microsoft Build of OpenJDK 11 will be supported until at least 2024, and the company plans on releasing OpenJDK 17 binaries by the end of the year, once Java 17 is finalized.

  • Google Switching from Oracle Finance Software to SAP

    Google Switching from Oracle Finance Software to SAP

    Google is reportedly switching from Oracle finance software to SAP, with the move occurring in the next few weeks.

    Google made the announcement in an email to employees, seen by CNBC. The move doesn’t appear to be related to Google’s Supreme Court win over Oracle earlier Monday. Nonetheless, there is no love lost between the two companies.

    As CNBC points out, Oracle refused to certify its software for Google Cloud for years, costing Google business as some companies were hesitant to use a cloud solution that didn’t have Oracle’s blessing. In response, Google started focusing on SAP deployment with its cloud offerings, rather than Oracle.

    That relationship appears to be advancing to the software Google uses in-house, with it adopting SAP’s financial software and migrating away from Oracle.

  • US Supreme Court Sides With Google Over Oracle

    US Supreme Court Sides With Google Over Oracle

    The US Supreme Court has handed Google a decisive victory in its decade-long battle with Oracle over the Android operating system (OS).

    Google made the decision early on to make Android compatible with the Java programming language and libraries. The decision was a smart move, since Java is one of the most popular programming languages, and that popularity helped jumpstart Android’s application ecosystem.

    Sun Microsystems, the original owner of Java, was supportive of Google’s decision. That changed, however, once Oracle bought Sun and the rights to Java. Oracle immediately launched legal action against Google, claiming it illegally copied the Java application programming interfaces (API).

    Google responded by claiming (correctly) that programmers use other companies’ APIs all the time to ensure their software is compatible with other software and services. As a result, Google argued that a win for Oracle would have severely damaging repercussions for the entire software development industry.

    Major companies and organizations backed Google in the fight, highlighting the existential threat to the software development community that Oracle’s case posed. If Oracle won, everything from everyday software to the Linux operating system could be under threat.

    After a decade of court battles, the Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Google, 6-2. In writing or the majority, Justice Stephen G. Breyer noted the following:

    In reviewing that decision, we assume, for argument’s sake, that the material was copyrightable. But we hold that the copying here at issue nonetheless constituted a fair use. Hence, Google’s copying did not violate the copyright law.

    The win is good news for Google, and even better news for the software industry.

  • Oracle Gets Boost From Barron’s Coverage of Company’s Cloud Business

    Oracle Gets Boost From Barron’s Coverage of Company’s Cloud Business

    Oracle’s stock has seen its best day in nearly a year on positive coverage of its cloud business by Barron’s, although some critics are not impressed.

    Oracle is the dominant company in the database business, and provides a range of middleware applications. The company has been working to gain a bigger portion of the cloud computing market, with mixed results.

    Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian, a former Oracle executive, famously called Oracle Cloud “a disgrace.” The company has also faced a lawsuit claiming executives hid issues with Oracle’s ability to compete in the cloud market.

    On the other hand, Oracle has scored some significant winsagainst its larger rivals, gaining business from Albertsons, Humana, McDonald’s and Xactly. The company also poached 8×8 from AWS and saw Zoom use Oracle’s Cloud for its latest expansion.

    Barron’s featured an articled entitled: “Oracle Is Turning Into a Cloud Giant. Why Its Stock Is a Buy.” The article made the case that Oracle could leverage its existing software and services to help grow its cloud business, potentially becoming the next major cloud player.

    As a result of the coverage, Oracle stock rose 5%, it’s biggest single-day gains in nearly a year. Nonetheless, it remains to be seen if Barron’s optimism is warranted. As of 2018, Oracle doesn’t break out its cloud earnings in its quarterly reports, making it hard to judge just how well the company’s cloud business is growing.

    CNBC points out that Oracle only reported a 1.9% growth in revenue in its latest report, far short of the estimated 37% growth rate of the cloud market in 2019. Again, without knowing what role Oracle’s cloud business played in its quarterly results, it’s hard to get an accurate read on well its business is doing. At the same time, however, 1.9% is not an encouraging growth rate.

  • Oracle Unveils Roving Edge Devices to Bring Hybrid Cloud to the Edge

    Oracle Unveils Roving Edge Devices to Bring Hybrid Cloud to the Edge

    Oracle has unveiled its Roving Edge Devices (REDs) to help customers bring the power of the cloud to the edge.

    Edge computing is becoming more cortical to organizations across a variety of industries, providing the ability to process data at or near the point of collection. Edge computing is especially important in industries where latency is critical, such as autonomous driving, medical applications and more.

    Oracle’s REDs are ruggedized, portable, scalable server nodes designed to help organizations run cloud applications in the most demanding environments and locations.

    “Customers want choice when it comes to running workloads in the cloud. Each customer has different requirements based on data sovereignty, scale, or wanting the full experience of a public cloud on-premises with all of Oracle’s cloud services. Oracle Roving Edge Infrastructure is the latest example, delivering core infrastructure services to remote locations,” said Clay Magouyrk, executive vice president, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. “Oracle’s hybrid cloud portfolio essentially delivers a cloud region wherever and however a customer needs it.”

    “With Oracle Roving Edge Infrastructure, Oracle yet again broadens its hybrid cloud portfolio by giving customers a taste of its public cloud wherever they may need it,” said Sriram Subramanian, Research Director, IDC. “Oracle designed its cloud infrastructure portfolio to make it as easy as possible for customers to move workloads to the cloud. Oracle Roving Edge, along with other offerings of the Oracle Cloud portfolio, gives customers multiple deployment and control options to run their most important workloads.”

    Oracle has been working to improve its position among the major US cloud providers. AWS currently sits in the top spot, followed by Microsoft and Google. Innovative solutions like REDs could help the company make up ground.

  • Oracle’s TikTok Purchase On Hold Indefinitely

    Oracle’s TikTok Purchase On Hold Indefinitely

    Oracle’s bid to purchase TikTok, in conjunction with Walmart, is on hold indefinitely as a result of the change in administration.

    The Trump administration aggressively went after a number of Chinese companies, including Huawei, ZTE, Xiaomi and TikTok, accusing them of being a threat to national security. The administration instituted bans against the first three, and was in the process of banning TikTok unless it could arrange for a US buyer to take over its operations.

    Oracle emerged as the winning candidate, along with help from Walmart, but the deal got caught up in red tape and disputesover how much control Oracle would actually have. Ultimately, even TikTok was left wondering about its fate, with a judge effectively granting it a stay of execution in the form a temporary injunction against the ban The judge also questioned whether the administration had the authority to ban the app in the first place.

    The Biden administration is currently reviewing the previous administration’s actions regarding various Chinese companies, and that has put the Oracle/TikTok deal in limbo.

    According to The Wall Street Journal, the Biden administration has asked to a delay an appeal against the injunction while it reviews the situation to see if the Trump administration’s actions were warranted.

    Needless to say, TikTok would no doubt prefer to remain independent. As a result, if there is a chance the current administration will abandon efforts to ban the app unless its purchased by a US company, there’s no incentive for talks to continue until the Biden administration reaches a conclusion.

  • Oracle Forms New Cloud and AI Organization

    Oracle Forms New Cloud and AI Organization

    Oracle has formed a new organization, focused on the cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) and helmed by executive VP Don Johnson.

    Oracle has been making significant headway in the cloud market, although it still lags behind market leaders AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud. Nonetheless, the company is doubling down on its cloud and AI business, and has scored some big wins agains its bigger rivals.

    According to Business Insider, Oracle is tapping Don Johnson, the former Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) boss to run the new organization, called Oracle Cloud Platform & AI Services. Johnson was once considered a top contender for the co-CEO job, making his appointment to the new role an indication of its importance.

    Interestingly, the new organization does not replace or operate independently of OCI, but will serve as an extension and expansion of it.

    “It’s important to note: this is an extension of OCI, not a division of it,” said an email announcing the change that was seen by Business Insider. “Together we’ll operate this as a unified OCI team, with a common all-hands, product roadmap, the usual meetings and processes, etc. One big tent and a common culture.”

    The email also emphasized how much the company is betting on the cloud moving forward.

    “Oracle is now fundamentally a cloud company, with a clear and simple vision: a marriage of the best cloud infrastructure, and leading data platform, together with the most pervasive cloud applications,” the email continued.

  • US Government Appeals TikTok Injunction

    US Government Appeals TikTok Injunction

    In the latest twist of the never-ending saga, the US government is appealing an injunction against its TikTok ban.

    The US government has been working to ban TikTok for some time. The Trump administration has accused TikTok of being a security threat, and made it clear that only a sale to an American company would prevent an outright ban. Oracle, with Walmart joining it, emerged as the winning bidder. Per the terms of the deal, however, Oracle would only gain a 20% stake in the company. Meanwhile, China signaled it would oppose a deal it felt was unfavorable to the country’s image.

    Meanwhile, TikTok was left in limbo as it tried to work out a deal with the US government as the deadline approached. The company won an injunction, with at least one judge even questioning if the ban was legally viable.

    Not willing to give up the fight, the US government is now appealing the injunction, according to Reuters. The Justice Department is bringing the case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

    Given that Judge Carl Nichols — when granting the injunction — said the government had “likely overstepped” in its decision to ban TikTok, this case could redefine the limits of the government’s authority.

  • Oracle Behind Spate of Google Antitrust Lawsuits

    Oracle Behind Spate of Google Antitrust Lawsuits

    Google is under siege as it faces multiple lawsuits from the DOJ and coalitions of states, a situation it may have Oracle to thank for.

    Oracle and Google have been locked in a legal battle since the former bought Sun Microsystems and the Java platform. When Google developed its Android mobile operating systems (OS), it intentionally made Android compatible with the Java libraries.

    Google made the decision in an effort to jumpstart Android’s popularity by piggybacking on one of the most popular programming languages in history. The thinking was that programmers would welcome using a programming language they were already proficient in, as opposed to developing for the iPhone which required learning Objective-C, a language rarely used outside of Apple’s ecosystem.

    At the time, the move was met with enthusiasm, including from Sun Microsystems. CEO Jonathan Schwartz even offered his personal congratulations:

    “I just wanted to add my voice to the chorus of others from Sun in offering my heartfelt congratulations to Google on the announcement of their new Java/Linux phone platform, Android. Congratulations!

    Once Oracle purchased Sun Microsystems three years later, in 2010, the tune immediately changed. Oracle sued Google for infringing on Java copyrights the company now controlled. The case has continued for the past decade, with both sides chalking up victories, and ultimately leading to arguments before the Supreme Court in October. The ramifications of the case could have far-reaching consequences for the software and tech industry.

    It appears, however, that Oracle is simultaneously fighting a completely different battle with Google, helping push regulators toward the current antirust cases.

    According to Bloomberg, Oracle sent officials in at least twelve of the states currently suing Google a “black box” presentation that outlined Google’s data privacy practices. Specifically, the presentation showed how Google tracked users’ data, including their location, even when the users’ Android phones were not being used.

    Ken Glueck, Oracle’s top Washington lobbyist and the man behind the antitrust campaign against Google, was thrilled with the action the states were taking.

    “I couldn’t be happier,” said Glueck told Bloomberg. “As far as I can tell, there are more states suing Google than there are states.”

    Obviously, any campaign on Oracle’s part was not the sole motivating factor. Google was already under investigation by some individual states, and the company had been under fire for years over its privacy and monopoly practices. Many believed a major lawsuit was inevitable.

    Nonetheless, it’s clear that regulators and investigators had an ally in Oracle, and the company may have provided just the push some of those regulators and investigators needed to move forward.

  • Amazon Will Provide Free Cloud Training to 29 Million

    Amazon Will Provide Free Cloud Training to 29 Million

    Amazon has announced it will provide free cloud training to some 29 million people around the world by 2025.

    Amazon’s AWS is the leading cloud platform, with 31% of the market. In spite of its lead, Microsoft, Google, Oracle and IBM have been making headway in an effort to close the gap. At the same time, the cloud computing market as a whole is experiencing unprecedented growth as a result of the pandemic and companies’ reliance on remote work.

    To help with the latter, Amazon is investing hundreds of millions to provide free training to 29 million people around the world over the next several years. Teresa Carlson, Vice President of Worldwide Public Sector at Amazon Web Services, made the announcement at re:Invent 2020.

    As part of our efforts to continue supporting the future workforce, we are investing hundreds of millions of dollars to provide free cloud computing skills training to people from all walks of life and all levels of knowledge, in more than 200 countries and territories. We will provide training opportunities through existing AWS-designed programs, as well as develop new courses to meet a wide variety of schedules and learning goals. The training ranges from self-paced online courses—designed to help individuals update their technical skills—to intensive upskilling programs that can lead to new jobs in the technology industry.

    Given the free training will be through “existing AWS-designed programs,” it’s a safe bet the training will also help Amazon maintain its lead in the cloud market. While the company is spending hundreds of millions of dollars, it’s hard to put a price on millions of people having their first serious exposure to cloud computing via Amazon’s platform.

  • Oracle Relocating to Texas

    Oracle Relocating to Texas

    Oracle has become the latest major company moving its headquarters from California to Texas.

    Wednesday, December 2, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HEP) announced it was moving its headquarters from California to Houston. Oracle is now the second major company in as many weeks to announce such a move, with plans to move its headquarters to Austin.

    Texas Governor Greg Abbott broke the news via Twitter.

    “We believe these moves best position Oracle for growth and provide our personnel with more flexibility about where and how they work,” Oracle told AFP News.

    “Depending on their role, this means that many of our employees can choose their office location as well as continue to work from home part time or all the time.”

    As the pandemic has transformed the workforce, leading to widespread adoption of remote work, it’s a safe bet HPE and Oracle won’t be the last companies to move to greener pastures.

  • TikTok Gains Reprieve Judge As Judge Blocks Ban

    TikTok Gains Reprieve Judge As Judge Blocks Ban

    The deadline for ByteDance to complete the sale of TikTok has come and gone, but a judge has blocked the ban, giving the company more time.

    The Trump administration labeled TikTok a security and privacy threat, threatening to ban it unless ByteDance sold its US operations to an American company. A date was set for the ban, although Oracle—partnered with Walmart—quickly emerged as the buyer.

    The deal almost immediately ran into issues, however, as Oracle was only buying a 20% stake in the company, not the full ownership Trump had wanted. At the same time, China changed its export rules to block selling what it deemed sensitive technology, including the algorithm that forms the backbone of the social media platform.

    To make matters worse, TikTok accused the government of not communicating with it, despite repeated attempts to meet the administration’s demands. This led the Commerce Department to signal it would not move to enforce the ban immediately.

    Now a judge has stepped in to ensure TikTok’s ban won’t go into effect. According to CNET, District Judge Carl Nichols said the government had “likely overstepped” its authority in its attempts to ban TikTok.

    While the Commerce Department said it will cooperate with the judge’s order, it is now saying it will “vigorously defend” the ban.

  • Five Companies Win CIA Cloud Contract

    Five Companies Win CIA Cloud Contract

    Five companies have been awarded a multibillion-dollar cloud computing contract by the Central Intelligence Agency.

    The CIA has awarded its Commercial Cloud Enterprise (C2E) contract to AWS, Microsoft, Google, IBM and Oracle. The goal of the contract to provide “foundational cloud services, including infrastructure-, platform- and software-as-a-service capabilities, as well as professional services,” according to Nextgov.

    As Nextgov points out, awarding the contract to multiple firms opens the way for multiple companies to serve the intelligence community in mission-critical ways. At the time, AWS has the highest clearance levels, with Microsoft coming in at second place. As the other companies continue working on the contract however, it stands to reason they will eventually qualify for top-secret clearances as well.

    The contract award is also a big win for IBM and Oracle, both of whom are working to establish themselves as top competitors to the Big Three.

  • US Commerce Department Won’t Enforce TikTok Shutdown Order

    US Commerce Department Won’t Enforce TikTok Shutdown Order

    The US Commerce Department has signaled it will not enforce the order to shutdown and ban TikTok.

    The Trump administration has been trying to force Chinese-owned TikTok to offload the American portion of its business to an American company. Oracle, partnering with Walmart, emerged as the leading candidate, although the terms of the deal were not what Trump had stipulated.

    Rather than taking full ownership, the terms of the deal stipulated that Oracle would take a 20% stake. In the meantime, China indicated it may not approve the deal as it doesn’t want to be seen as weak, giving up one of its star companies.

    As the involved parties continued to negotiate, however, TikTok filed with a US court of appeal to have the order forcing a sale overturned. The company cited the extraordinary efforts it had gone through to comply, only to hear radio silence from the Trump administration.

    Now the Commerce Department has said “it wouldn’t enforce its order that would have effectively forced the Chinese-owned TikTok video-sharing app to shut down, in the latest sign of trouble for the Trump administration’s efforts to turn it into a U.S. company,” according to The Wall Street Journal.

    It remains to be seen how the TikTok saga will ultimately turn out, and what impact a Biden presidency could have on the deal.

  • TikTok Wants to Know What’s Going On With Its Ban

    TikTok Wants to Know What’s Going On With Its Ban

    Wondering what’s going on with TikTok’s ban? Evidently, so is TikTok, as the company’s future has been left in limbo.

    TikTok dominated the news for weeks as the Trump administration tried to force the social media platform to sell to an American company under threat of ban. Trump eventually issued an executive order banning the company, although a court ruling delayed it from going into effect.

    In the meantime, Oracle and Walmart together emerged as prospective buyers, although not the way Trump had envisioned. While Trump had said the social media company would be under control of an American company, and free from Chinese control, the initial deal Oracle struck was for a 20% stake in the company, with control firmly in China’s hands.

    Further exacerbating the situation was a ruling by the Chinese government blocking the export of certain technology, including the algorithm TikTok uses, putting the deal in further doubt. Chinese state media also claimed the government would not approve the deal, saying that to do so “would endanger China’s national security, interests and dignity.”

    Now, with the deadline for working out a deal coming to an end, TikTok wants to know what’s going on.

    “For a year, TikTok has actively engaged with CFIUS in good faith to address its national security concerns, even as we disagree with its assessment,” TikTok says in a statement to The Verge. “In the nearly two months since the President gave his preliminary approval to our proposal to satisfy those concerns, we have offered detailed solutions to finalize that agreement – but have received no substantive feedback on our extensive data privacy and security framework.”

    In the meantime, the company has filed with a US court of appeals to have the divestment order overturned.

  • Financial Network, Inc. Leaves Oracle In Favor Of MariaDB SkySQL

    Financial Network, Inc. Leaves Oracle In Favor Of MariaDB SkySQL

    Financial services firm Financial Network, Inc. (FNI) is leaving Oracle’s platform in favor of MariaDB SkySQL.

    MariaDB was forked from MySQL when Oracle acquired the database engine in 2009. Developers were concerned about the future of MySQL under Oracle, and wanted a version of the database that would remain independent of Oracle, while at the same time maintaining full compatibility.

    MariaDB Corporation pairs the database with SkySQL for “the first and only database-as-a-service (DBaaS) to bring the full power of MariaDB Platform to the cloud, combining powerful enterprise features and world-class support with unrivaled ease of use and groundbreaking innovation.”

    SkySQL is offered as a DBaaS on Google Cloud Platform, and MariaDB is used by Google, Mozilla, Deutsche Bank, DBS Bank, Nasdaq, Red Hat, ServiceNow, Verizon and Walgreens. Now, FNI is leaving Oracle in favor of MariaDB and SkySQL.

    “MariaDB has been a true collaborative partner for us in our journey to the cloud,” said Bryan Bancroft, lead database administrator at FNI. “With SkySQL, we don’t have to bother with containers or managing the database, that’s left to the database professionals at MariaDB. We also have the option of easily expanding our applications to leverage blended transactions and analytics when the time is right. Moving to MariaDB from Oracle was a key strategic business decision for us and has ultimately saved us up to 80% in database costs – allowing us to reinvest the savings into delivering new, critical solutions for our customers.”

    The announcement is a big win for MariaDB and a loss for Oracle, just as the company is doubling down in an effort to take on its bigger cloud rivals.

  • TikTok Wins Reprieve Against Being Banned

    TikTok Wins Reprieve Against Being Banned

    TikTok has won its latest round against the Trump administration, getting a temporary injunction against the administration’s looming ban.

    A ban that would have stopped individuals from downloading TikTok in the US was set to go into effect Sunday at 11:59 PM. TikTok filed for an injunction to prevent that from happening, with a judge granting it with only hours to spare.

    TikTok has been at the center of ongoing drama as US officials have accused it of being a national security threat. The US has been pushing for a deal that would see US operations taken over by a company not under Chinese control. While Oracle, in conjunction with Walmart, were able to come to terms with TikTok’s parent ByteDance, it remains to be seen if the deal will receive final approval.

    ByteDance has stated that majority ownership and board control will remain China-based. China has also taken issue with the US trying to force a sale of TikTok. Any of these factors could ultimately derail existing plans.

    In the short term, however, it appears TikTok has received a new, albeit it temporary, lease on life.

  • Benioff: There Would Be No Salesforce Without Larry Ellison

    Benioff: There Would Be No Salesforce Without Larry Ellison

    “There would be no Salesforce without Larry Ellison,” said Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. “I am absolutely indebted to him. I am very grateful to him. We’re very close friends. Larry has a huge vision for the world. He is an incredible executive. You should never sell Larry Ellison short. Everyone in the world knows that.”

    Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, says that without Oracle founder and CEO Larry Ellison there would be no Salesforce:

    There Would Be No Salesforce Without Larry Ellison

    Larry Ellison is my mentor. He was my first investor at Salesforce. He was my first Board member. There would be no Salesforce without Larry Ellison. I am absolutely indebted to him. I am very grateful to him. We’re very close friends. Larry has a huge vision for the world. He is an incredible executive. You should never sell Larry Ellison short. Everyone in the world knows that. I don’t understand everything that’s going on. But wow, I’m so impressed by seeing them and everyone else make these aggressive moves.

    I’m mostly worried about the companies that aren’t making aggressive moves. I’m calling CEOs who are friends of mine, who are in paralysis and who aren’t making moves. I’m saying look you’ve got to get into participation. You’ve got to get out of paralysis and into participation. You have to become relevant. Larry Ellison is the master of relevance. This is a move to make him relevant. This is so important. He’s giving you a master class in relevance.

    Participation, Relevance, and Enablement

    You have to enable your organization in new ways. We’re having weekly all-hands calls with tens of thousands of employees every single week. We haven’t done that since we were a startup because we have to enable people in new ways. These ideas, participation, relevance, and enablement. This is what we have to be focused on if we’re going to accelerate and go forward. Then we have to deliver the tactical plays and success stories to make it happen.

    Some companies are making that happen and some companies are just sitting back and being too passive. You’ve got to look at both of these organizations.

    Benioff: There Would Be No Salesforce Without Larry Ellison
  • China Won’t Approve TikTok Deal, Says State Media

    China Won’t Approve TikTok Deal, Says State Media

    China state-affiliated media says that the Chinese government will not approve the current TikTok deal with Oracle and Walmart. The editor of a communist party paper, Global Times, tweeted this:

    Based on what I know, Beijing won’t approve current agreement between ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, and Oracle, Walmart, because the agreement would endanger China’s national security, interests and dignity.

    The Global Times editor later explained his tweet within an article in the newspaper making these points:

    For instance, American citizens will take up four of the five board seats for TikTok Global and only one can be Chinese. The board of TikTok Global would include a national security director, who will have to be approved by the US.

    Oracle will have the authority to check the source code of TikTok USA and updates. As the TikTok and Douyin should have the same source code, this means the US can get to know the operations of Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok 

    TikTok Global will control the business of TikTok around the world except China. It will block IP from the Chinese mainland to access it. This means the Americans can take control of the global business of TikTok and reject Chinese to access it.

    Source: Global Times

    The Global Times editor says that “the US suppresses it with all its national strength and forces it to sign a deal under coercion.” The editor added that “China, also a major country, will not yield to US intimidation and will not accept an unequal treaty that targets Chinese companies.”

  • TikTok Deal: ‘Virality Driving This Asset To Be Worth $200 Billion’

    TikTok Deal: ‘Virality Driving This Asset To Be Worth $200 Billion’

    “Given the amount of content on that channel with the amount of marketing that’s being spent to drive more users there’s a virality that is driving this asset to be worth over a period of time $100 to $200 billion,” says Wall Street Analyst Alex Zukin. “That’s why we think that for Oracle to invest at a $7.5 billion stake for a company potentially worth $60 billion today (and $200 billion later) could be compelling and add value to the share price.”

    Alex Zukin, RBC Capital Markets, discusses why Oracle investing in TikTok is a real opportunity of the company to change the narrative and be relevant and exciting:

    It does appear to us the Oracle has a real opportunity to change the narrative for the company. A narrative that has to do with growth, that has to do with cloud, that has to do with being relevant and exciting again. That is a really interesting opportunity again to add shareholder value.

    Oracle is a fiesty competitor. Never underestimate Larry Ellison if he wants to get into a market. It started with the announcement that Zoom is a customer earlier this year. That was a big deal. That was really their first highly relevant actionable customer win that stood out to us. They are compounding their gains if they are able to successfully add TikTok.

    When Oracle is looking for opportunities to change the narrative the fact that it is looking at this rather than potentially large scale M&A suggests that the valuation environment may not be one that supports that type of path right now. This is definitely an innovative construct to change the relevant narrative for the company.

    The data indicates that the kind of engagement that this app is driving is not just unique but in the history of applications in internet software difficult to replicate. The amount of people that spend more than ten minutes, more than 30 minutes, or more than an hour engaging is very different than most established apps. Not just the amount of people that are engaging but the amount of time and the amount of people that are engaging over a certain amount of time.

    It’s always possible that these types of things can be replicated with enough investment over a big piece of time. But the truth is right now given the amount of content on that channel with the amount of marketing that’s being spent to drive more users there’s a virality that is driving this asset to be worth over a period of time $100 to $200 billion. That’s why we think that for Oracle to invest at a $7.5 billion stake for a company potentially worth $60 billion today could be compelling and add value to the share price.

    TikTok Deal: ‘Virality Driving This Asset To Be Worth $200 Billion’