Oracle Presents Oracle VM Virtualization

During Oracle OpenWorld, Oracle VM presented. This new virtualization technology for servers will be available for download from Wednesday. An analyst has questioned Oracle’s decision to dive into the virtualization world.

Oracle VM is based on Xen’s virtualization software and should be able to run both Oracle and non-Oracle applications in a virtualized environment. However, says Oracle president Charles Phillips, special attention has been paid to making the recent Oracle software work correctly in the virtualized environment.

The software will be available for free download from Wednesday. Those who want to make use of support can conclude contracts with Oracle for this; other companies in the industry will also offer support. For support of a system with an unlimited number of CPUs, $999 per year per server will have to be paid. For a server with up to two CPUs, Oracle maintenance contracts cost $499 annually.

In front of Forrester Research analyst Galen Shreck, it’s not entirely clear why Oracle has entered the virtualization market. “Although the company can have a large number of installed setups, the question remains to what extent customers are waiting for virtualization software from the company.” Furthermore, Shreck believes that Oracle will have its hands full trying to keep up with the competition in the feature area.

However, according to Nucleus Research analyst Rebecca Wettemann, it is a logical choice for Oracle, as the company has been offering grid software for sale for some time. She expects that the company will particularly attract users who are not yet using virtualization in their server fleet, but that it will prove significantly more difficult to attract customers from Microsoft, Xen, VMware and other virtualization companies.