Charles Phillips, Oracle president, says the company will provide continued enhancements to current Oracle Applications (JD Edwards, Oracle, PeopleSoft and Siebel) beyond the delivery of Oracle Fusion Applications in 2008.
'We are giving customers the best of both worlds -- more value from their existing applications, which we plan to enhance indefinitely, and an option to upgrade free-of-charge to future technologies, if customers have a business case to do so,' says Phillips.
Andrew Krause, director, applications business unit, Oracle SA, says dedicated development teams will work closely with customer advisory boards and user groups to design new releases and functional enhancements to current Oracle Applications product families.
These will include next-generation application capabilities, such as XML reporting, data hubs, Business Process Execution Language, Business Activity Monitoring and industry-specific analytics to the current Oracle Applications. 'These next-generation enhancements will leverage the same industry standards and technologies that we plan to use in Oracle Fusion Applications,' says Krause.
Oracle has also announced the Lifetime Support Policy for all product lines, providing access to technical experts for as long as customers license their Oracle products, Krause adds.
'It delivers maximum value by providing rights to major product releases, so customers can take full advantage of technology and product enhancements. Oracle's Lifetime Support Policy also puts customers in control of their upgrade strategy. Our flexible support policy stages make it easier for customers to plan and budget for Oracle's exclusive product upgrades. We plan to maintain all our families of products as long as they remain viable. This means that there is no longer a minimum 2013 support date,' Krause states.
The company furthermore plans to leverage its Fusion Middleware platform and infrastructure investments across all product lines, says Krause.
Plans for a PeopleSoft Enterprise 9.0 release over the next 12 months are also on the cards. 'Oracle is in the early planning stages of the post-9.0 releases. In addition Oracle has announced plans for a Siebel 8.0 release in the next 12 months, and is in the early planning stages of the post-8.0 releases, and we are working with customers to prioritize requirements,' he says.
Krause concludes: 'The future of the customers' investment is secure.'