Join our day by day and weekly newsletters to receive the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn more
This Oracle Database has long been one of the most generally deployed technologies in enterprises. However, that doesn’t mean that enterprises have to run it on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI).
Today, Oracle and Google officially announced the general availability of Oracle Database@Google Cloud. Both vendors originally announced the service was in development on June 11 with few details, but that has modified as of today. The service is initially available in 4 Google Cloud regions: US East (Ashburn), US West (Salt Lake City), UK South (London), and Germany Central (Frankfurt). Plans are already underway to expand the offering to quite a few additional regions across North America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, and Latin America in the coming months.
Customers can now deploy Oracle Exadata Database Service, Oracle Autonomous Database, and Oracle Database Zero Data Loss Autonomous Recovery Service directly into Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) in Google Cloud data centers. This integration enables organizations to leverage Oracle database technologies while also leveraging Google Cloud infrastructure and services. The partnership is designed to simplify cloud migration processes and speed up innovation for customers. By combining Oracle’s database expertise with Google Cloud’s advanced AI capabilities, equivalent to Vertex AI and Gemini models, organizations can develop latest applications and gain faster insights from their data.
“I think the world’s data actually runs on Oracle databases, you know, we’re the world’s most popular enterprise database,” Karan Batta, senior vp of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, told VentureBeat in an interview. “I think it’s really critical, even though we’re a cloud provider, that we provide access to any customer that wants to have access to their data in any cloud they choose, so Google is just another step in that direction.”
Why Oracle Database@Google Cloud is such a big deal
Oracle has been steadily expanding the cloud footprint of its namesake database in recent years. The Google partnership follows a similar agreement with Microsoft that became generally available on June 20.
Batta noted that while the Microsoft deal is just like Google’s latest rollout, the kinds of workloads can sometimes differ. In the case of the Google deal, AI is also a key a part of the discussion. Customers can build AI applications using Oracle data in Google Cloud. The integration allows customers to leverage Google’s AI services, equivalent to Vertex and Gemini, to build AI applications using Oracle data.
“Customers who come to us are looking for choice and want to have the different technologies they use today all in one place,” Amit Zavery, vp and general manager of platform at Google Cloud, told VentureBeat. “I think this news is important because it expands that opportunity.”
Zavery noted that the Oracle database is a selection that many Google customers have already made. As such, it’s necessary for Google to make sure that those customers have the easiest access to Oracle technologies and can use them as a part of their Google Cloud experience.
Google Cloud has its fair proportion of database technology, which has recently been updated. The partnership is not currently bi-directional, in a way that permits Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) users to directly access Google Cloud databases.
Users of Google Data Analytics and Business Intelligence tools might be pleased
In addition to enabling AI, the integration could prove helpful for Google Cloud data analytics services like Big Query.
Zavery said the integration makes it easier for customers who have significant investments in Oracle databases and applications to make use of Google BigQuery for data warehousing and reporting. They can now seamlessly access their Oracle data through BigQuery.
“A lot of enterprise applications have an Oracle database on the back end,” Zavery said. “If you have one and you want to create a web data warehouse or a reporting framework, maybe you’ve already decided that it should be BigQuery or Looker as your analytics platform, we can really let you do that from the same console, environment and interface, which you couldn’t do before, and now it’s easy to do.”
How Oracle Database Actually Works in Google Cloud
A key challenge to enabling Oracle Database to run efficiently for enterprise use cases on Google Cloud is the issue of latency. After all, if the data isn’t in a Google data center, there’s some latency and potentially a performance hit.
Oracle and Google approach this problem directly.
Batta explained that for the 4 Google Cloud regions where the service is currently being deployed, Oracle is extending OCI’s physical infrastructure into a Google data center. This is a different approach than simply an optimized connection between two different data centers.
“We’re really moving from a connection that’s a long wire to a short wire because essentially our infrastructure is in some way in Google’s data center,” Batta said.