Oracle Fusion
Fusion has been the talk of the ERP community since Oracle went on a $19 billion shopping spree, acquiring several companies, including PeopleSoft and J.D. Edwards. Until their presentation, "Half Way to Fusion" on January 18, 2006, little was known about Fusion, other than Oracle's promise to 'fuse' Oracle's various products to create a next-generation ERP solution that retains the best of Oracle's product lines. Customers doubted Oracle's ability to merge such disparate products and feared being forced to upgrade to whatever Oracle creates. Here is how Oracle responded on the 18th:
Fusion Defined
Fusion will not be an attempt at merging code and data models as some
have guessed, but rather will be the next release of Oracle's ERP
offering. It will be written from the ground up and will be based on
standards, including Java, XML, BAM and BPEL, rather than proprietary
coding and reporting tools like PeopleCode and SQR. Oracle will use
its
knowledge, combined with 50 years of process experience, and human
capital gained in its recent acquisitions, to create best practices
across a wide array of industries and to develop a best-of-breed data
model.
Oracle's customers will benefit from grid computing and declarative development (no coding required). Oracle also promises that Fusion will be an upgrade, not a migration, and that customers will not need to upgrade their entire system at one time. Customers will not be forced to upgrade, because Oracle has promised to continue to support 'legacy' applications until at least 2013.
Half Way to Fusion
Charles Philips, president of Oracle, opened the presentation with the
declaration that Oracle is half way to Fusion. Mr. Philips claimed
that Fusion is just another major software release, no different from major
software releases in the past, except that Oracle will benefit from
combined knowledge and experience. Oracle has finished defining the
requirements, the data model, and has released middleware based on
Fusion technology. Customers can expect some non-disruptive Fusion
component upgrades in 2006.
Many experts are not optimistic that Oracle is half way to Fusion, and most agree that it will require a disruptive migration when it is delivered. It's important to note that if Oracle is half way to Fusion after one year of effort, the product should be finished at the beginning of 2007 - but Oracle hasn't updated the promised delivery date of 2008.
Oracle's Recommendations
Whether or not Oracle meets its delivery date, customers should begin
preparing for Fusion by upgrading to the latest versions of their
products. The newest versions of PeopleSoft and J.D. Edwards tend to
include features that previously required custom bolt-ons. Oracle
recommends taking advantage of the new features and removing
customizations where possible. Customers should also begin
implementing Fusion technology, including Fusion middleware, reporting and BPM. If
everything goes as planned, the upgrade will require a migration to the
new Fusion data model and an upgrade to the applications. That's a big
"if."
