Oracle enters hardware business with HP

By Erwin Oliva INQUIRER.net SAN Francisco, California -- Oracle announced its entry in the storage and data base hardware business with Hewlett Packard (HP) as partner, Oracle CEO Larry E llison said here at Oracle Open World. Oracle will enter the storage server and database server market in hopes of pro viding a technology solution to the growing and complex database and storage de mand from enterprises. Working with computer company HP, Oracle expects to rival products of existing storage and database server players, Ellison said. Mark Hurd, Chairman of the Board and CEO of HP, said the computer giant is exci ted to work with Oracle in delivering these two joint products. "This is a great thing for Oracle and HP and for our customers," said Hurd who joined the announcement over a video feed beamed into Moscone Center. Ellison said HP and Oracle have co-developed these new products for three years , adding select customers are already running these systems for a year. Ellison said Oracle's storage server, dubbed Exadata Storage Servers, aims to s olve the growing database requirements of organizations. Meanwhile, Ellison said the HP Oracle's Database machine will compete directly with existing rival products. The HP Oracle Database Machine is made up of a grid of Oracle Database Servers and a grid of new Oracle Exadata Storage Servers packaged in a single rack orde red as a complete system from Oracle. The latest offering is a result of Oracleâs and HPâs long-time engineering rela tionship, Ellison said. Ellison explained that Oracle Exadata Storage Servers intend to solve the "data base bandwidth problem" that occurs between database servers and conventional s torage. The Oracle CEO said the HP Oracle Database Machine is a powerful machine config ured for data warehousing. Hurd said the two new products runs on HP Proliant technology combined with Ora cle software and Intel's latest microprocessors. HP Oracle Database machine includes a grid of eight database servers, 64 Intel processor cores and Oracle Enterprise Linux; and a grid of 14 Oracle Exadata St orage Servers that include up to 168 terabytes of raw storage and 14 Gigabits p er second data bandwidth to the database servers. "I know you have a burning question. How much music can this hold," Ellison qui pped as he introduced the Oracle Database machine to attendees of Oracle Open W orld.