While much attention is focused on what SAP and other software companies are doing to combat Oracle, and what Oracle is doing to itself, an interesting set of smaller players - third party maintenance providers - will likely tie up Oracle like they did Gulliver.
Forbes describes how Siebel is going after Rimini. But every few weeks I talk to a firm which is already doing work with PeopleSoft and JDE customers who have cut off Oracle maintenance. They do it on the quiet and do not publicize their maintenance offerings. I know of others which are planning overt campaigns similar to Rimini. TomorrowNow, now owned by SAP, has offered such services for a while.
Oracle can sue each one of these firms or can read the writing on the wall. Maintenance is over priced when all you are getting are bug fixes and level 4 help desk support. There is too much uncertainty about the next release of most modules and whether the Fusion architecture will be robust enough for them to write 22% a year checks. Either Oracle steeply discounts maintenance or loses customers to third party firms.
While SAP can gloat about this, it needs to worry about its own customer base. As I wrote earlier TomorrowNow's big opportunity is in the SAP customer base, not Oracle's. Just because you buy a Mercedes does not mean you have to keep going back to the authorized dealer for every premium priced service.
