Oracle Corporation

IBM’s (IBM) capital expenditure has been stable for the last five years due to its huge data center investments.

Oracle (ORCL) reported its fiscal 2018 results on June 19. Its fiscal 2018 revenues rose 6.0% YoY to reach $39.8 billion—its fastest growth since 2011.

Of the 20 Wall Street analysts following Oracle stock, only one has a “sell” recommendation.

According to a new report by research firm MarketsandMarkets, the global enterprise resource planning (or ERP) market is set to expand at a healthy annual rate in the next few years.

In 2017 to date, Oracle stock has surged 33% and outperformed the computer software sector, which grew 24% year-to-date.

Mark Hurd, Oracle’s co-CEO, nearly doubled the company’s sales staff to ~35,000 workers in the last six years.

Google, Alphabet’s operating unit that manages cloud computing, noted that it is only a matter of time before it overtakes AWS to become the world’s largest cloud vendor.

Microsoft’s Cosmos DB is expected to make conventional data migration easier. Although this bodes well for Microsoft, it is expected to have an adverse impact on Oracle’s cash cow—its database business.

Microsoft’s forward annual dividend yield was ~2.3% on May 15, 2017, and Oracle’s and IBM’s yields were ~1.7% and ~4.0%, respectively.

Walt Disney (DIS) is carrying a total debt of $21.6 billion. But can it easily pay the interest?

Salesforce meets or exceeds analyst expectations Earlier in this series, we discussed Salesforce’s (CRM) initiatives and the threat posed by Microsoft (MSFT), Adobe (ADBE), and Oracle (ORCL) in the cloud space. Despite this mounting competition, with each passing quarter, Salesforce has managed to increase its revenue guidance. Earlier, Salesforce expected revenue of $10.1 billion–$10.15 billion […]

Microsoft’s edge over Salesforce in the cloud Earlier in this series, we discussed how Adobe’s (ADBE) and Microsoft’s (MSFT) collaboration could loosen Salesforce’s (CRM) grip on the cloud computing space. Salesforce pioneered SaaS (software-as-a-service) and had a first-mover advantage over peers Microsoft, Oracle (ORCL) and IBM (IBM). However, Microsoft soon became a dominant player in […]

In fiscal 2Q17, Microsoft’s (MSFT) Azure revenues rose 93%, and its computing usage more than doubled on a year-over-year basis. In constant currency terms, MSFT’s growth reached 95%.

Oracle (ORCL) has targeted the Asia-Pacific region, the Middle East, and North America to open more data centers in 2018.

As of January 25, 2017, Microsoft continues to be the largest software player by market capitalization on a global scale.

Salesforce pioneered SaaS, and since its launch, Salesforce has developed an impressive mix of cloud-based offerings.

A slowdown in RDBMS (relational database management systems) was reflected in Oracle’s new software licenses, falling 11% in fiscal 1Q17 to ~$1.03 billion.

Oracle was trading at a forward EV-to-EBITDA multiple of ~8.3x on December 8, 2016. This metric was lower than Microsoft’s multiple of ~10.3x.

The concept of economic moat is the basis of Morningstar’s assessment of a company’s (KO)(ORCL) long-term investment potential.

The relationship between Oracle and NetSuite goes back a long way. Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and his family own almost half of NetSuite stock.

Cisco acquired Meraki in November 2012 for $1.2 billion. Meraki’s technology provides a means to control Wi-Fi networks through the cloud.

In the last five years, Amazon’s revenue has risen at a compound annual growth rate of 22% thanks to its flourishing e-commerce sales.

Earlier in this series, we discussed Salesforce’s (CRM) recently announced fiscal 1Q17 earnings. Now, let’s look at the company’s value proposition.

Earlier in the series, we discussed Salesforce’s (CRM) fiscal 1Q17 results and the company’s growing relationship with Amazon (AMZN).

The Fed’s cautious approach and global growth concerns are weighing heavily on the US dollar, whose decline has impacted SAP’s fiscal 1Q16 performance.

Of the 38 analyst recommendations on Microsoft’s stock, 60.5% were “buys” as of April 6. Meanwhile, ~29% of recommendations were “holds.” The remaining ~10.5% of recommendations on the stock were “sells.”

As of April 6, 2016, Microsoft was the largest software player by market capitalization on a global scale. It was followed by Oracle (ORCL).

On August 20, 2015, Oracle (ORCL) announced the acquisition of Maxymiser. The financial details of the deal weren’t disclosed.

While a section of the market is readying itself for a rate hike in the upcoming meeting of the FOMC, there are others who don’t believe that a rate hike would be implemented and instead, are focused on falling inflation.

Cloud is moving into a second wave of adoption. Organizations are leveraging cloud to fuel innovation, growth, and disruption.

The growing preference for open-source technologies and databases plays a crucial role in Oracle’s recent struggles.

Oracle’s Rapid Retargeter helps to reconnect with the known customers or registered users who have left or abandoned their shopping carts.

Oracle’s strategy of transitioning to cloud seems to be yielding results. The revenue from overall software continues to dominate its top-line revenue.

IBM (IBM) intends to fuel its growth in the cloud space through the investment of billions of dollars, as well as strategic acquisitions.

Oracle has been growing its CRM segment rapidly by making strategic acquisitions to expand its position in the CRM market.

Oracle’s expanded cloud platform includes new functionality for big data analytics, integration, process management, Java Platform Standard Edition, and Node.js for server-side JavaScript.

Renaissance Technologies is an investment management firm. The fund’s portfolio decreased to $36.52 billion in the third quarter—compared to $42.89 billion in the second quarter.

Salesforce.com (CRM) got ~94% of its fiscal 2014 and six months ending FY15 revenue from subscription and support fees. The fees are associated with cloud services. This implies that it has a huge investment in cloud-based application services. Salesforce.com offered solutions as a system for customer relationship management (or CRM) through cloud.

EMC, Pivotal, and VMware’s (VMW) virtual infrastructure collectively forms the “federated” business model of EMC Corp. The business model is unique because although all three businesses focus on their core functions separately, they all play a vital role in the delivery of IT as a service (or ITaaS).

Even though the current conditions index reached a four-year high, survey respondents were less optimistic over future business conditions.

Major contributors to the operating expenditure are marketing costs and research and development (R&D) expenses that leads to value added products and services development.

The “Internet of Things” is the network of physical objects, that connects them to the internet.

R&D costs typically form 10%–20% of the revenues for software companies.

Software and hardware are integrally linked, which makes it confusing to distinguish one from the other.

“Software” refers to computer program or data (bits and bytes stored), that can be stored electronically.