META Group has warned Australian Oracle customers to fight the company if it attempts to extract more fees from them through a 'clarification' of its licence terms.
According to the IT analyst group, Oracle is exerting pressure on its existing US-based customers to switch from user to processor-based licensing systems.
Kevin McIsaac, META Group program director, said that if the database software maker imposes what he called a "re-interpretation" of the its licence terms locally, Australian companies may find their database licensing fees increase five-fold.
"I can guarantee you that Oracle will be observing the US situation very closely," McIsaac said. "If Oracle is successful in extorting this money from those [US] clients they will try it here."
The source of the dispute is the accepted definition of the term -multiplexing" within Oracle database licences.
Currently, multiplexing licences can be enforced when Oracle's database software is used on the back-end of a system accessed by multiple users. In such a scenario customers can purchase a processor-based licence or license all users accessing front-end applications.
According to META Group observers, Oracle is now trying to argue that batch feeds, processed by Oracle databases, come under the definition of multiplexing. Put simply, Oracle customers will have to pay for all users that contribute to data processed by the database software, regardless of its origin.
"I have reviewed hundreds of Oracle contracts in the last two-plus years. None of them have contained provisions of that sort," META Group analyst Mark Shainman said, describing the interpretation as "bizarre".
The analyst group fears for the wellbeing of data warehousing providers that service online trading. Some may find their licence obligations increase from a handful of users to 10,000 overnight.
Oracle rejects the META Group's claims.
-It's certainly not a reinterpetation," Oracle Australia spokesperson, Roland Slee, told ZDNet Australia. -At best you could describe this as a clarification."
The company defended its licensing policy which it said has been consistent and in effect for several years.
-The Meta Group report represents what we believe are a handful of misunderstandings about the policy," Slee added.
According to Oracle, the situation that META Group represents is the result of enquiries from customers seeking to clarify their position rather than Oracle-initiated action.
McIsaac guaranteed that this was not the case. He said that Oracle sales staff imparted the news to customers -- data warehousing providers in many instances -- during routine on-site visits.
"Oracle has had another very poor quarter, and Wall Street relies on quarterly revenue reports," McIsaac said. "This is an attempt to extract more revenue form their existing customers."
Currently the licensing furore appears to be confined to the United States. McIsaac said that META Group has received around six to eight complaints from US-based companies who have been contacted by Oracle to clarify its position on the licence.
Oracle Australia said it has no intention of using this clarification to actively extract higher revenues from its existing customers. However, it confirmed that it would be make sure it was understood when entering new business arrangements.
Time to loot at PostgreSQL and MySQL!
As was discussed on ZDNet.AU recently, there are many solid, fast, fully-implmented SQL databsae engines which are opern source and free. Included in this are ADABAS from SAP and InterBase from Borland/InterBase. If Oracle is causing you grief, jump onto another ship, one with few restrictions of movement and zero fare cost.