Oracle’s Wookey speaks on Richardson’s ERP doomsday scenario

As a follow-up to his recent postulations on the potential demise of the ERP market (see “R.I.P. ERP?” dated August 30, 2006, here at CRMchump.org), AMR Research’s Bruce Richardson called in Oracle head of application development John Wookey for a long interview.

The man who Richardson describes as “having the most difficult job in Silicon Valley" naturally had much to say on the subject of service-oriented architecture and a few choice comments on Oracle.

As background, Richardson explains that Oracle is currently trying to have its cake and eat it, too: While cranking out components for their much-ballyhooed Fusion program, Oracle must also build a whole new Fusion platform. “We expect people to embrace Fusion,” said Wookey, “but we want them to move to Fusion based on when it makes the most business sense for them.” And onto to the interview we go.

One important revelation was (for the first time in eighteen months, according to Richardson’s calculation) Wookey’s admission that Oracle has “a very clear objective to be No. 1 in applications.” With confidence, Wookey went on to say that “we see the coming shift in technology as the perfect opportunity to take the No. 1 position.”

As for Fusion web service projects currently underway, Wookey enumerates pet projects regarding integration linking ERP to Siebel CRM and to PeopleSoft Asset Management. Wookey said that projects in production “are based on our Fusion Middleware business process management technology and APIs / web services from the products.”

When Richardson tried to get Wookey to open up a bit about Fusion applications, a bit of an industry concern that some have gone so far as to label “vaporware” and “FUD tactics,” Wookey stated that the cone of silence is “intentional” and that “We will talk about Fusion a lot in coming conversations.” (It must be asked: In this case, is no news really good news?)

Hilariously enough, Richardson actually asks Wookey for his opinion on Richardson’s own ERP doomsday piece. If you’d really like to read what is something of a long-winded answer, you can check the link below. Wookey does exude confidence on the issue, though, and Richardson should admit there may be a few holes in his science-fiction predictions.

On Oracle’s OpenWorld convention scheduled for October 22 to 26, Wookey promised his firm would detail the progress made in Oracle lines such as EBS 12 and Enterprise 9. Richardson himself will be there to cover the proceedings, so here at CRMchump, we’ll be watchdogging this particular e-media outlet.

The full interview, entitled “Oracle’s John Wookey on Fusion, SOA, and the Battle to be No. 1 can be found at http://www.amrresearch.com/Content/View.asp?pmillid=19730

Bruce Richardson is a trends analyst with almost 25 years of experience in the field, almost 20 years of it with AMR Research and has covered the SAP market since 1991. He is responsible for spearheading new market research and contributing to the AMR analysis of leading market trends in areas including ERP, supply chain management, service-oriented architectures, and software-as-a-service.

Founded in 1986, AMR Research is an advisory firm focused on supply chain, enterprise applications, and infrastructure. The AMR Research Market Analytix Report Series provides technology vendors with targeted marketing and competitive information on key application markets of ERP, SCM, CRM, procurement and sourcing, PLM, and HCM.