Is Oracle Dying?
Oracle Corporation was founded in Jun 1977 by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner, Ed Oates. Over the years, it has risen to become almost indisputable leader of the Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) market with 44% (Source: IDC 2009) – at least, for now, though, no one is sure how long that numero uno position will last. There were heady days of 1996-2008 or so when Oracle ruled the world of RDBMS. It was unchallenged crown king that could do no wrong. Hundreds of thousands of Database engineers, architects, administrators spoke of Oracle as if it was actually the famed “Oracle of Delphi”. Conference passes to Oracle Open World were so coveted that it was distributed to star employees in any company using Oracle Products.
However, after 2008, the downward spiral has been very perceptible to the database communities. The hush-hush talks could now be heard very loud and clear. Only that Oracle was perhaps hearing but valiantly choosing not to listen. It continued to maintain the arrogance of a star past its prime - denying that it was aging, claiming that the talent would always trump the age.
I think the Oracle Goliath had forgotten that for every arrogant Goliath, there is a David that is bound to introduce it to its nemesis. But my guess this downward spiral perhaps set into motion long before 2008 or so when world started noticing it.
Time machine
Let us trace Oracle Journey through its very meager beginnings and how it lost its course along the way. The chronological sequence of this journey could be roughly as I have shown below:-
1977 SDL (Oracle 's predecessor) founded
1978 Oracle Version 1 developed
1979 First commercial SQL RDBMS
1983 Oracle Version 3, first RDBMS developed to run on mainframes, PC, minicomputers, VMS 1984 first RDBMS to offer read-consistency
1985 Released of Oracle Version 5, first RDBMS in client/server environments
1986 Oracle IPO (NASDAQ)
1987 Rises to number one in the world for RDBMS, Oracle gets into
However, after 2008, the downward spiral has been very perceptible to the database communities. The hush-hush talks could now be heard very loud and clear. Only that Oracle was perhaps hearing but valiantly choosing not to listen. It continued to maintain the arrogance of a star past its prime - denying that it was aging, claiming that the talent would always trump the age.
I think the Oracle Goliath had forgotten that for every arrogant Goliath, there is a David that is bound to introduce it to its nemesis. But my guess this downward spiral perhaps set into motion long before 2008 or so when world started noticing it.
Time machine
Let us trace Oracle Journey through its very meager beginnings and how it lost its course along the way. The chronological sequence of this journey could be roughly as I have shown below:-
1977 SDL (Oracle 's predecessor) founded
1978 Oracle Version 1 developed
1979 First commercial SQL RDBMS
1983 Oracle Version 3, first RDBMS developed to run on mainframes, PC, minicomputers, VMS 1984 first RDBMS to offer read-consistency
1985 Released of Oracle Version 5, first RDBMS in client/server environments
1986 Oracle IPO (NASDAQ)
1987 Rises to number one in the world for RDBMS, Oracle gets into
References: http://finance.yahoo.com http://www.oracle.com http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/22/technology/22oracle.html?_r=0 http://www.forbes.com/2001/10/29/1029orcl.html http://www.zdnet.com/oracles-customers-a-bit-baffled-by-fusion-strategy-says-report-7000011143/ http://www.networkworld.com/news/2013/011713-oracle-cloud-265922.html How the Mighty Fall: And why some companies never give in – by Jim Collins, Collins Business Essentials