Manufacturing Executive - March/April 2009 - (Page 28) ment effort, analysts and others close to the project say. Not only did Oracle add a number of new applications to its portfolio after launching the Fusion Applications project — Hyperion, Stellent, G-Log, Demantra, and others — but also it acquired middleware vendor BEA Systems. That deal — and Oracleʼs subsequent decision to adopt BEAʼs Weblogic server as the strategic Java applications server underlying its middleware and applications suites —complicated and possibly delayed the Fusion Applications project, observers say. In fact, Oracleʼs decision to place the Fusion Applications program under Senior VP and Middleware Chief Thomas Kurian following Wookeyʼs departure last year was widely seen as an attempt to better coordinate next-generation middleware and applications development. Now, say analysts and customers routinely briefed by Oracle on Fusion Applications, the key message from Oracle is that the company is more interested in the quality of Fusion Applications than in meeting a deadline. “Theyʼre emphasising the quality of the release over the schedule,” says Floyd Teter, an IT project manager at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and chairman of the Oracle Applications User Groupʼs Fusion Council, a group that receives Fusion Applications updates from Oracle regularly. Now, experts say, rather than positioning Fusion Applications as its applications crown jewel and the logical destination for most customers, Oracle is telling users that Fusion Applications is just one of three equally viable paths for customers. In addition to migrating to Fusion Applications, other paths are to: (AIA). Introduced in spring 2007, AIA is a set of packaged, services-enabled business semantics and a programming model that enables integration between Oracle and non-Oracle applications. The integration packs enable end-to-end process integration. One integration pack, for example, supports order-to-cash processes by tying together Siebel and EBS suites. So far, sources say, few Oracle customers or partners have signed onto AIA. Still, customers could use the AIA strategy to extend the useful life of legacy enterprise applications. Although Oracle has provided applications customers with abundant alternatives to its next-generation suite, Fusion Applications retains strategic importance to the company for a couple of reasons, experts say. First, Fusion Applications will be key to Oracleʼs hopes of attracting new applications customers in emerging markets such as financial services, telecommunications, and retail. And, second, Fusion Applications represents an opportunity for Oracle to demonstrate the value of building a next-generation application suite on top of its middleware stack. “A key part of the message is the inherent value of an integrated stack,” Shepherd says. “Itʼs embarrassing for them to have a huge applications portfolio, with many products that arenʼt built on their stack.” espite all the changes in the circumstances surrounding Fusion Applications, the basic outline and scope of the initiative donʼt appear to have changed much. Fusion Applications, analysts and customers say, is still positioned as a complete, integrated, SOAenabled suite. The initial release is expected to cover common, horizontal processes and is not expected to include a lot of vertical, industry-specific functionality. Oracle officials have told JPLʼs Teter, for example, not to expect a core manufacturing module in the initial release of Fusion Applications. What is expected to be included are core financials (general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, Steve Miranda fixed assets, etc.) as well as human Senior Vice President for Fusion Applications, Oracle capital management, customer relationship management, procurement, government/regu— Continue to run existing enterprise applications latory compliance, and some supply chain management such as EBS, PeopleSoft, Siebel, and JD Edwards functionality. While Fusion Applicationsʼ financials under the Applications Unlimited program. Oracle has and basic data model are expected to borrow heavily committed to continue to fund dedicated development from Oracleʼs EBS suite, much HCM functionality will teams for each core applications suite, and analysts come from PeopleSoft. expect ongoing enhancements for each product line, The suite is also expected to incorporate from including adoption by each of additional Fusion PeopleSoft the notion of trees, used to organise data Middleware components. elements and place values in relationship to one — Stay on existing applications and extend them another. And Fusion Applications will be modelusing Oracleʼs Application Integration Architecture D Worth the Wait? “ Fusion Applications CRM will incorporate Web 2.0 communication techniques, such as chat. “ 28 Manufacturing Executive MAR/APR-09
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