The phones are ringing off the hook over here so it's apparent many folks aren't drinking Big O's Cool-Aid.
 

What malarkey! It's obvious what's going on here:

The big story to report is that Oracle is fighting desperately to keep the maintenance stream they've bought from 22 acquisitions over the last 2 years. PeopleSoft, JDE and other customers are defecting in droves to SalesForce.com and SAP, while others are pulling the plug and going into LegacyMode.

STOP LYING BIG O, it doesn't flatter you.

That's because, as first generation CRM product, Siebel was such a pesky application that most shops are thankful to be rid of it soon. Unlike Payroll and Manufacturing applications, of which functionality has been stable for some time since the 1980's on green screen systems, CRM as a business philisophy was new when Tom Siebel quit Oracle in 1992 and hung out the first CRM shingle.

LegacyMode has worked with Siebel and why any self-respecting shop would keep it in LegacyMode we cannot fathom. Instead, look to your core stable apps for LegacyMode, and spend the savings on new CRM.

Only question that remains is will Oracle capture that future CRM revenue or will it be Salesforce.com and the hosted model?

Wookey: "We [Oracle] are talking well in advance of what we are building." Translation: We haven't built anything yet.

Wookey: "We will re-architect even if it is non-essential to your organization." Translation: no translation.

Wookey: "E-Business Suite 12 is the first Fusion component." Translation: Confirming what we wrote in this space last year, Fusion is a functionally enhanced version of Oracle's e-business Suite.

Wookey mentioned XML Publisher a 1/2 dozen times or more. Translation: Watch this product as a major component of project Fusion.

Wookey: "Every 10-20 years there is a major [IT] shift and we're starting to see that now [with SOA]."  Translation: We're prepared to sell you more software.

It's increasingly apparent that Oracle can't turn the ship fast enough.  On one hand, SAP (via NetWeaver) has got them chasing a massive, expensive re-architecture project of unknown duration and scope. On the other hand, the on-demand, off-premise vendors (i.e. Salesforce.com) will decimate Oracle's expensive on-premise consulting revenue model.  Prudent shops are going legacy to sit out the battle...

Whether described as hosted, ASP, on-demand, or utility computing, most pundits agree that these off-premise computing delivery models will eventually overtake in-house IT deployments. The reason is simple – the current on-site, on-premise ERP delivery model is just too costly.

Admittedly the off-site model has been slow to emerge. But just as large firms once provided in-house electricity generation, such network centric activities like ERP are usually cheaper, faster, and better performed at some end point upstream. This leaves you to focus on the core business at hand. Indeed, history has shown that ever since client-server architectures were fraught with client side complexity we’ve been steadily moving toward increased IT simplification through centralization. The consumer software markets are ahead of Corporate IT in this realm, where a consumer’s entire digital existence can already be housed in cyberspace.

Thus the argument behind yet another in-house upgrade or migration to a new ERP platform (i.e. Fusion) is superseded by the rapidly emerging off-premise delivery model. Such a trend begs the question: Why invest in a costly upgrade or migration NOW, when it is certain that we will be faced with a major investment to move our ERP off-site in the next decade?

Instead, for many cost-conscious PeopleSoft shops, it’s decidedly better to rest on the sidelines with a stable application while the off-premise model matures over the next decade. Application encapsulation of the existing deployed product set provides time for the market to play itself out, and a clear future computing model to emerge.

A: We expect Fusion to be a functionally enhanced version of Oracle's e-business Suite. Oracle has spent enormous sums of R&D budget to build out its modern Java-based enterprise architecture (version 11i) and there is no reason to expect it would be abandoned due to acquisitions. In fact, Oblix, Retek, AND PeopleSoft functional technologies can ALL expect to be folded into this SOA-enabled technology stack as the years progress.

PeopleSoft shops should pursue risk-mitigation strategies and avoid making any hasty decisions despite inevitable upgrade pressures. Remember, Oracle is consumed in a "stack war" with SAP and prudent customers will endeavor not to be caught on the front lines.  Just like the database wars of the 1990’s, this war will last several years. Content with existing functionality, many cost-conscious PeopleSoft customers are examining legacy deployments to wait out the battle.