Oracle, Meta Group Spar

The Meta Group reported that several Oracle corporate customers audited by the vendor were assessed new charges,in some cases "millions and millions of dollars",because they were using Oracle software in multiplexed environments.

In multiplexing situations, an Oracle data warehouse might act as a front end for batch-processing feeds from a mainframe serving as a repository for multiple data sources. Oracle reinterpreted existing licenses so any user putting data into a mainframe or other repository that flows into a data warehouse must now pay for an Oracle named-user license or move to a pricier per-processor model, said Mark Shainman, an analyst at Meta Group. The firm advises corporations on technology issues.

Oracle has not reinterpreted its licenses, said Jacqueline Woods, vice president of global practices at Oracle. However, any accounts that were "inadvertently misinformed" by Meta Group about licensing will not face additional charges after all, she said.

Oracle is not auditing more customers than usual, said Woods. It reviews 400 out of 150,000 total customers yearly, she said.

Shainman said if Oracle continues to define multiplexing as it does now, thousands of customers using Oracle data warehouses or data marts,especially those with non-Oracle back ends,could be impacted.

"If you must count all the front-end users of the mainframe and license them as Oracle named users, there's a huge impact on any corporation with heterogeneous environments," Shainman said.

Hank Johnson, vice president of Stonebridge Technologies, an Addison, Texas-based solution provider, said the economy has been "rough sledding" for all enterprise software companies. New license sales for Oracle were down 30 percent for its last fiscal quarter, and database sales were down 25 percent, according to the company.

Wells Fargo securities analyst Rob Tholemeier said, "The question is are customers starting to feel that Oracle is desperate and being tougher [in contract negotiations?"