Oracle prepares to enter PaaS wars

29.05.2012
Oracle may lay out how it plans to become a player in the burgeoning PaaS (platform as a service) market next week during a featuring CEO Larry Ellison and co-president Mark Hurd.

The company first announced Oracle Public Cloud at the OpenWorld conference . The Public Cloud header encompasses Oracle applications delivered as SaaS (software as a service) as well as PaaS features, including the Java Cloud Service and Database Cloud Service.

Oracle already announced the availability of Fusion HCM (human capital management) and CRM (customer relationship management) via the Public Cloud, but so far the PaaS components have remained available only on a "preview availability" basis. It's possible that Ellison and Hurd will declare those services are generally available.

Company spokeswoman Deborah Hellinger declined to provide more details on the announcements planned for the event, which will also include discussion of "game-changing advances in Oracle Support."

Many details about the PaaS services have already been made available on Oracle's website, meaning that the interest in next week's event may center on specifics about strategy, pricing and delivery dates.

Java Cloud Service allows developers to create Java Enterprise Edition-based applications using standards such as JSP, JSF, JPA and JAX-WS, according to the Public Cloud website. It's also possible to use third-party Java frameworks such as Hibernate and Spring. In addition, a range of Java IDEs (integrated development environments) are supported.