Anyone who ever followed the relational database wars probably noted this tidbit last week: Oracle’s flagship database. WebLogic Server middleware and Java are all now generally available on Microsoft Windows Azure as “license-included virtual machine images” in the Windows Azure Image Gallery.
The timing was not really a surprise; Last month, Microsoft had signaled that it would post the images on March 12. But some background is in order: It wasn’t all that long ago that Microsoft armed with SQL Server went to war against the Oracle database juggernaut. And it made headway at least in Windows shops, in small and mid-sized companies and in departments of enterprises. But Oracle retained its market share lead by holding onto large accounts in financial and other compliance-preoccupied industries.
Given that history, it really was news last June that Oracle and Microsoft said they would forge peaceful coexistence and put Oracle software onto Azure, fully certified and supported by Oracle. Before it was certified on Windows Server. Given that Oracle is building a cloud of its own, this seemed a little like sleeping with the enemy.
So why the change of heart? Well for one thing, there are enemies and then there are enemies. Microsoft and Oracle came late to the cloud, while Amazon Web Services, which turned 8 last week, has built up dominance in public cloud. Enterprise software companies, including but not limited to Oracle and Microsoft know they have to do something to stem the momentum of AWS. Pricing for Oracle stuff on Azure is listed below. (gigaom)
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