During an analyst call shortly after the announcement, Catz said, “I’m still here and I’m an employee [of Oracle].” She said that the transition is being made now because Oracle has recently reported some very large potential new contracts. “We wanted to make the transition when things are going great,” she said.
Bickley said the likely impact on Oracle customers in the near term is minimal. But he stressed that Oracle is making its AI move very differently from others, which makes sense given Oracle’s different market position.
Unlike other hyperscalers such as Microsoft, Amazon, and Google, Oracle is content to hold onto its massive database installed base and simply add AI services for those enterprises, making its offerings stickier. This contrasts with most of its rivals that are trying to grow their AI installed base by either stealing customers from each other or bringing in a larger percentage of newcomers.
