The forced digital transformation that came in the wake of the pandemic forced many businesses and organizations to move to the cloud. However, there are some concerns about vendor lock-in and impedances to movement between different clouds.
To address issues like this one, Google and Oracle are touting a new service offering that they say will bring flexibility and make the cloud open.
As adoption continues, can the cloud’s core components be commoditized and become like network pipes where the focus is shifted to value-added service delivery, just like telcos did?
Will it?
On the question of commoditization, Chris Chelliah, Oracle’s VP and chief architect of core technology and cloud, believes that this may indeed be the case. He points to compute and storage as components that will likely go the route of commoditization.
Touting Oracle’s heritage Chelliah said that value will have to be driven around data, data management, and collaboration tools.
He emphasized the importance of Oracle’s “differentiated devices” around autonomous databases because data can be coupled with cloud compute to power artificial intelligence and machine-learning applications.
Where it’s all headed
He also drew attention to Oracle’s software-as-a-service offerings that include ERP (enterprise resources planning) and CRM (customer relationship management.)
Oracle currently operates 29 cloud regions globally, in countries like Australia, Japan, and India. It plans to add another nine, including Singapore, by July this year. A year ago, it added one region every 26 days, to hit 19.
Google Cloud’s Asia-Pacific VP, Karan Bajwa, believes that we are not so close to commoditization. He pointed out that price-points continue to see downward pressures as more adopters get on board. An open cloud would make consumers less uneasy and make it so that enterprises aren’t locked-in with one vendor.