Fujitsu And Oracle Extend Long-Term Sparc Partnership

Fujitsu has signed up to with Oracle to continue a decade-long partnership based on the Sparc technology which originated at Sun Microsystems. The teo companies have put forward a plan for cheaper faster Unix servers in future.

The deal with the Japanese technology giant endorses Oracle’s handling of the technology it acquired from Sun; as a software company, its hardware skills had been questioned when the deal was first announced. The deal also includes a new product distribution agreement; as well as a commitment to further joint engineering, marketing and sales promotion efforts.

Oracle’s combative chief executive Larry Ellison said his firm’s relationship with Fujitsu had “never been stronger”.

Joint sales of servers

The deal will see the two companies jointly sell Sparc Enterprise servers. Meanwhile Fujitsu also signed on the dotted line of a new Oracle PartnerNetwork distribution agreement. This will give  Fujitsu the ability to resell and distribute Oracle products, as well as act as a systems integrator and solution provider for the overall Oracle product portfolio.

But more significantly perhaps is the news that the two companies are now offering a future roadmap of  Sparc Enterprise M-series servers. These M-series servers, which be branded with both Fujitsu’s and Oracle’s logos are expected to be able to provide 15 times better performance in the next three years.

“I am very pleased that our partnership with Oracle continues to grow,” said Masami Yamamoto, President of Fujitsu. “We believe our active partnership with Oracle, in addressing greater sales and services on a global scale, will produce a richer and more vibrant solution environment for our joint customers.”

“Oracle’s partnership with Fujitsu has never been stronger,” said Larry Ellison. “We are entering a new phase with Fujitsu, aligning our engineering and worldwide distribution efforts with a focus on high-performance, highly-reliable systems.”

Sparc Plans

Oracle has previously been keen to discuss its plans for Sun Microsystems’ enterprise hardware offerings. Indeed, in August 2010, Oracle officials finally began talking about plans for high-end Sun Sparc servers, a move that was welcomed by analysts.

In December Oracle introduced a bunch of new Sparc-based data centre products, and Ellison could not resist the opportunity to make some jibes about his server competitors. He compared Oracle to a big cheetah, IBM a stallion, but he said that HP was a turtle.