Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) yesterday proved it wasn’t kidding when it said it would keep Sun’s data storage business, announcing plans to compete in the markets for disk and tape storage.
In presentations and documents, Oracle outlined its strategy now that its merger with Sun Microsystems is complete.
During a day-long event Wednesday, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison touted Sun’s storage systems as a good alternative to NetApp (NASDAQ: NTAP), while new Oracle hardware exec John Fowler said the Sun 7000 open storage line — now the ZFS Storage Appliance — will be at the heart of the company’s storage strategy, and the two have already partnered on the Sun Oracle Database Machine, or Exadata 2.
“Storage is an extremely critical component of our customers’ information management requirements,” Oracle said in an FAQ document. “Because of the nature of the database and applications business, Oracle has been investing for many years in storage-related software and clustering technologies.
“Sun brings end-to-end storage solutions that include leadership in software and hardware, integration of flash, leadership in long-term information management and retention, as well as a fully unified storage and disk portfolio. We plan to enhance investments in Sun’s storage core areas, with a focus on integration, performance, manageability, and security.”
Oracle also said it is committed to Sun’s StorageTek tape portfolio, calling it “the industry leader over IBM.”
The company will continue to enable high-end tape subsystems to operate with IBM’s z/OS Multi Virtual Storage (MVS) mainframe operating system. “Oracle plans to continue to invest in tape innovations that address the storage needs of mainframe customers,” the company said.
Oracle also pledged to make sure that its new tape business continues to work with third-party backup and archive applications, including Oracle Secure Backup.
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