The News: On August 9, Oracle announced Oracle Compute Cloud@Customer, a rack-scale cloud infrastructure that enables organizations to use Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) compute services anywhere. With Compute Cloud@Customer, customers can develop, deploy, secure, and manage workloads using the same software stack as OCI in deployments as small as a single rack. Read the full Press Release on Oracle’s website.
Oracle Compute Cloud@Customer: Taking Cloud Services to New Heights
Analyst Take: Oracle has debuted Oracle Compute Cloud@Customer, developed primarily to enable organizations to run applications and middleware on OCI compute, storage, and networking services with flexible virtual machine (VM) shapes in their data centers. When combined with Oracle Exadata Cloud@Customer, it is the best-suited platform for workloads that are tightly integrated with Oracle databases.
Accordingly, organizations can use the same OCI services in their data centers and Oracle Cloud Regions, while developers and IT managers can use the same APIs and management tools to deliver a consistent user experience (UX) everywhere. Organizations can also migrate and consolidate existing workloads as well as deploy new cloud-native applications on a fully-managed cloud platform in their data centers, enabling them to capitalize on OCI’s cost-effective consumption model to streamline operations and reduce costs.
I believe Oracle has established the distributed cloud foundation essential to advancing market acceptance of the new Compute Cloud@Customer offering. Through its distributed cloud strategy encompassing multi-cloud, public cloud, Cloud@Customer, and dedicated cloud regions, Oracle is meeting customers where they are and according to their topmost demands. This commitment especially applies to ensuring that customers can locate and secure their compute and data requirements in full compliance with government regulations and industry standards.
Specifically, Oracle products are purpose-designed to assure interworking with other cloud providers across multi-cloud environments. For multi-cloud, Oracle is focusing on building out a cloud ecosystem that delivers the next generation of interconnect technology. Oracle already supports the Oracle-Azure Interconnect and Oracle Database Service for Azure, which enable customers to access Oracle Database, Autonomous Database, Exadata Database Service, and MySQL HeatWave through the Azure portal. Oracle also has a native deployment of MySQL HeatWave on AWS.
Compute Cloud@Customer: Oracle Delivers Sharp Capacity and Price Advantages
From my view, Oracle Compute Cloud@Customer stands out in the cloud infrastructure landscape against its top hyperscaler rivals: AWS Outposts, Azure Stack Hub, and Google Distributed Cloud Edge. With an impressive 2,208 cores per rack, it surpasses AWS’ 576 cores, Azure’s 1,536, and Google’s 288. For individual VMs, Oracle stands out with 96 cores, AWS and Google come in at 48 cores, and Azure offers only 32. Storage capacity is a major selection criterion where Oracle shines, providing a robust 3.4 petabytes against AWS’ 435 terabytes, Azure’s 1.5 petabytes, and Google’s modest 19.8 terabytes.
And when you consider that AWS Outposts has not really received any material updates in 4 years, and that Azure Stack Hub requires you to buy your own hardware from a list of different vendors and hire an Azure Stack Operator to manage it all, you can see that these vendors’ commitment to a full-blown modern cloud experience on-premises is not at the top list of their priorities, but rather a check box of sorts.
In stark contrast, Oracle offers comprehensive storage services encompassing block, object, and file, while AWS lacks file storage, Azure skips object storage, and Google neglects object storage. Oracle uniquely delivers storage versatility, allowing customers to change protocol on demand, a capability that is missing in action from its rivals. Compute Cloud@Customer also has direct high-speed connections (up to 800 Gbps of dedicated bandwidth) to Oracle databases on Exadata Cloud@Customer meeting the needs of latency-sensitive applications.
Even more convincing for enterprises is that Oracle wraps in the cost of enterprise support, whereas competitors levy additional charges. FInally, regarding cost-effectiveness, Oracle is pricing its solution at $53 per core monthly, significantly undercutting AWS’ $143 and Google’s $84, while Azure does not follow the cloud pricing model.
Moreover, I see Compute Cloud@Customer delivering the services at the same price as Oracle Cloud Regions across the globe as providing the cost consistency needed to help accelerate enterprise adoption. For example, both Compute Cloud@Customer and OCI public cloud are only $0.03 per hour per OCPU for compute standard—AMD EPYC E5 services and only $0.0255 per GB per month for standard object storage services.
Key Takeaways: When It Comes to Cloud Services On-Premises, Go Big or Go Home
Overall, I find that Oracle Compute Cloud@Customer ensures customers can run the same OCI services anywhere and in full accord with managing their distributed cloud environments from a single control plane—a massive boost to uplifting the overall cloud experience. Plus, customers can dynamically scale up their workloads to meet peak requirements while having the full assurance to scale down to decrease costs. Equally essential is fulfilling the data residency, security, and latency requirements of all customers based on their unique demands.
For organizations looking to deploy cloud services on-premises, the message I see is “go big or go home”. From my view, so many on-premises cloud services are either warmed-over hardware boxes gift-wrapped with financial engineering tools, I see them offering one-tenth the capabilities of their public cloud counterparts or assembled from third-party components. Oracle’s latest Compute Cloud@Customer offering clearly bucks this trend with a completely integrated cloud platform—built, installed, owned, and managed by Oracle. It delivers the same compute, storage, networking, APIs, control plane, and a growing list of services that are also available in OCI with the same consumption-based pricing. It is part of the company’s strategic distributed cloud strategy and as such is a full-ranging cloud experience on-premises—not a “litmus test” like other cloud vendors are peddling.
Disclosure: The Futurum Group is a research and advisory firm that engages or has engaged in research, analysis, and advisory services with many technology companies, including those mentioned in this article. The author does not hold any equity positions with any company mentioned in this article.
Analysis and opinions expressed herein are specific to the analyst individually and data and other information that might have been provided for validation, not those of The Futurum Group as a whole.
Other insights from The Futurum Group:
Oracle MySQL HeatWave Lakehouse: Delivering a New Competitive Level Set for Cloud Data Warehouse
Oracle and AMD Go All Out in Powering New Competitive Advantages with Exadata X10M Debut
Author Information
Ron is an experienced, customer-focused research expert and analyst, with over 20 years of experience in the digital and IT transformation markets, working with businesses to drive consistent revenue and sales growth.
Ron holds a Master of Arts in Public Policy from University of Nevada — Las Vegas and a Bachelor of Arts in political science/government from William and Mary.
