9. Oracle makes strong headway as an enterprise supplier

Let me start by saying that I currently have no business ties to Oracle – this prediction isn’t a ‘thank you’ to the company in any way. It’s the result of studying the financial results of 180 vendors every quarter since 2008. Sun was the world’s largest server supplier for a period in the 1990s and combined with Oracle in 2010 to become one of the deepest thinking, different and often most frustrating supplier of all. It’s clear vision of social business and the way businesses had to change in order to make the most of new computing techniques was balanced by expensive and inflexible pricing of its world-leading database and ERP offerings. Like IBM it was one of the first traditional enterprise suppliers to embrace the cloud as a delivery model for its software and hardware infrastructure offerings. In 2017 a number of other suppliers launched (or planned to launch) special cloud services to accommodate Oracle’s different software offerings.

As increasing numbers of customers shift their spending to off-premise solutions so the differences between the way Oracle does business ceases to be as important – the acquisition, funding and management of Oracle products will stop being a limiting factor for many.

Just like Apple in 2009 Oracle looks set to make a major push in 2018, especially as it builds out the international capabilities of its newly-acquired NetSuite business. My ninth prediction is that it will outgrow most other enterprise IT suppliers in the year, using its cloud services approach to win multiple new customers and rise from a long period of relative obscurity.

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