Why Oracle must move in on Content Management

Alan Pelz-Sharpe, VP Software and Services

Oracle has been promising to make big moves in content and document management for at least the last four years. But to date they are yet to make their mark, despite some good technology developments with IFS, Collaboration Suite and the Portal products. The truth is Oracle is known as a company that manages data in databases.

The murkier world of unstructured (content) data management is simply not one that they currently have any real visibility in, with a sales team that may have little grasp of the domain complexities of content and document management issues. In fact Oracle probably do have expertise and to some extent the technology to compete, but buyers instead turn instead to IBM, Documentum, FileNET and more recently Microsoft.

In many ways, a move by Oracle to bolster its unstructured data management business makes more sense than acquiring PeopleSoft/JD Edwards. Data management is the core competency for Oracle. 80% of data is unstructured, and by definition it represents a huge, if complex and difficult, opportunity for IT vendors.

In this current economic climate, opportunities are thin on the ground. But a quick look at Microsoft’s incredible success with Sharepoint Portal Server (almost a million seats a month shipped in the past 18 months) in the same space, and the opportunity is clear and proven. What is also clear is that for ECM to rise from its current niche status into the mainstream it will take a major infrastructure player to take it there. Microsoft’s entry into the market is the start of that move, but the opportunity is only just being tapped. There remain plenty of spoils for those looking further up the food chain at medium and larger organisations.

Oracle lacks weight and credibility in the unstructured data market. Our advice to them would be to either invest heavily in a marketing campaign to bolster their presence in CM/DM or acquire instant status – something that makes a great deal of sense to us at Ovum. Whether this is something Oracle will contemplate is purely a matter for speculation, but it’s a move that could work well for them. So who are the most obvious acquisition targets? Of course when, like Oracle, you have such a depth of pocket, then almost any player is available. So who is the best fit, rather than who is affordable, is the question.

As the Web Content Management space is largely tanking, our advice to Oracle would be to look widely at the ECM (Enterprise Content Management) space for targets. In particular we would suggest they look at the likes of Documentum or OpenText with their focus on collaborative document and content management. Either company could provide a good fit, with instant kudos and credibility in the market.

An added consideration is that Oracle actually has much of the technology needed for ECM already in place and would be best advised to look at acquiring domain expertise, a solid brand with real credibility in the CM space and a sales force who truly ‘get’s unstructured data management. With those things in mind the net opens even wider and could include the likes of FileNET or Hummingbird.

Oracle has seen a lot of success with its Collaboration Suite solution over the past year and building on that success may prove more valuable in cementing their footprint within the enterprise, and ultimately on every desktop, than a further move into the business application sector.

Ultimately, though, as long as Oracles strategy at this stage in their development is to target those with credibility and a solid customer base, rather than just impressive technology, they will have a big impact on any market sector. With Microsoft already throwing their weight around in the CM space, Oracle stepping in to it too would add a further level of turbulence to a sector that is ripe and bursting with potential. But if Oracle continues to just stick to its own thing in CM, a great opportunity could be lost.

Organisations are now realising the value of their knowledge and exploiting intellectual capital is seen as the key route to ROI. See the e-Knowledge@Ovum Advisory service for more on how Ovum can help your organisation understand information management.

Contact Alan Pelz-Sharpe directly on APS@Ovum.com. To learn more about Alan, click here.