Oracle CloudWorld 2013

Oracle CloudWorld is coming to your city soon, here is the schedule

Sydney, Australia	March 13	Register Now
Mumbai, India	April 2	Register Now
New York City, United States	April 2	Register Now
Singapore, Singapore	April 4	Register Now
Tokyo, Japan	April 9	詳しくはこちら
Frankfurt, Germany	Coming Soon	Notify me when registration opens
London, England	Coming Soon	Notify me when registration opens
Mexico City, Mexico	May 7 http://www.oracle.com/events/global/en/cloudworld/register/index.html

I wonder if it is too late for Oracle to get into the cloud computing bandwagon ?
Oracle suffers from its database centered marketing, which is under threat with Big Data solutions.
Oracle has to play catch up on Big Data now though it still retains its grip on its citadels in the Banking and Financial Services & Insurance (BFSI) sector
Oracle has some of the best business applications in the world either their own or acquired, Oracle has  done a fair job of integrating the various acquisitions into a single platform. But its complacency on not willing  launch them as SAAS services has cost them dearly in getting their rightful place in the cloud computing world.
Even Oracle's foray into the operating system world with acquisition of SUN has been lukewarm, with SUN hardware and operating systems being bundled with Oracle database.
Oracle had the best database, business applications, operating systems, hardware environment and  a hands on leader who is one of the greatest Marketing Gurus in the IT world.
Finally Oracle has been a non-starter on the mobility and social media space, maybe because of the rigidity and culture of database creation which holds it back. It has not built any solutions in this space from its labs or by acquisition . Hence Oracle is weak in dominating  end point devices which play a significant role in Cloud Computing deployment.

Will Oracle give up its past laurels on focus on the cloud which is the "Future of Computing" or will it also start slipping like Microsoft in Cloud Computing?
Look forward to  Oracle's vision for Cloud Computing in the Oracle CloudWorld 2013!

Will love to hear your comments and thoughts on this blog post, thankyou.

Cloud Appliance the Boat for Enterprise Cloud Computing

Cloud Appliances

A cloud appliance is an off the shelf computing  equipment delivered fully assembled and tested, with the software stack loaded and configured. When the appliance is connected to the power and network and turned on, it works. This is one of the easiest methods to build a private cloud as an IAAS deployment, so if you had three cloud appliances in three data centers and a network, all you need is to plug in the three cloud appliances and Presto you have an enterprise (private)  cloud. 

Cloud Appliance the Boat for Enterprise Cloud Computing

all photos in this blog courtesy Ajay Gopal (aj2z on Twitter)

Today's cloud appliance are more matured and can be deployed for connecting to the public cloud thus creating a hybrid cloud. So now you have your enterprise private cloud and you can connect to the large and powerful public cloud using the cloud appliance. 

This allows the the enterprise to use the cloud appliance as a boat to the public cloud and when the enterprise is ready it can discard its own private cloud by pulling the plug on the cloud appliance (Boat).
I call the cloud appliance a  Boat and not a Bridge because the cloud appliance is used like a boat to cross a body of water at the end of the crossing you leave the boat behind whereas a Bridge is a permanent  structure and is a continuous link . 
As understanding the cloud offering and the marriage with the cloud service providers strengthens, the enterprise  can  abandon the boat and board the Mother ship ( Public Cloud). Of course if the business still requires it  can continue to run the enterprise private cloud and leverage on the public cloud thus benefiting from the strength and security  of a hybrid cloud. 
The business/enterprise will decide on what will run on the Public Cloud and what will run on the enterprise (private) cloud.  The Control remains with the business until it Trusts the public cloud . 

Barriers to using the Powerful Public cloud will be overcome with use of Cloud Appliance. 

The introduction of the cloud appliance accelerates the adoption of the public cloud by the enterprise with the comfort of the CIO/CTO  that the team members and technology investments will not be made redundant immediately, rather they will be phased out in a structured and planned time frame. 
Many cloud service providers and appliance vendors  have introduced or have plans to introduce cloud appliances, they include, IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, HP, AMAX offers CloudMax, Intalio and OpenBravo Cloud Appliance to name a few. 


IBM's Cloud Appliance
IBM's offering of Cloud Appliance is its  Workload Deployer v3.0 and WebSphere CloudBurst Appliance V2.0.
http://www-01.ibm.com/software/webservers/workload-deployer/features/index.html?S_CMP=wspace

IBM will now be able to offer its Enterprise Customer a ride into Public Cloud Computing offered by IBM which has almost all the popular  Enterprise Applications under its Hood. 

This will allow BIG BLUE an accelerated ride into the cloud computing market and I can sign off by stating that the Elephant has not Forgotten to Dance. 
Footnote: This post was inspired by Mr. Anupam Garg (anupam.gaur@in.ibm.com) of IBM who shared about  IBM's cloud appliance offering at the Mumbai Cloud Camp last week.