Oracle wants to bring the cloud to all of its 4,000 on-site customers in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) in the next two years. It's a tough job, but Arun Khekar, Oracle's senior vice president of enterprise applications for the Middle East, Africa and India, said in an exclusive interview with TechRadar Middle East that it was Possible and that was his goal. "I'm pretty stressed and in the next 16 months we have a lot to gain if we get it right, unlike any other cloud provider," he said. Khekar wants more than 1,000 of its on-premises customers to move to the cloud this year. About 70% of the 4,000 clients are based in the United Arab Emirates.
700 live cloud clients in the region
Khekar is convinced that the opening of a data center in Abu Dhabi last February has helped the company in many ways. "In the past, the sale would have taken weeks, but the UAE data center has made things easier and the big names have joined us," he said. Oracle has more than 700 active cloud customers in the Middle East and Africa, including Emaar Group, Fine Hygiene Holding, Landmark Group, and DP World, among others. "Many of our clients don't even ask where the data center will be, with the exception of regulated sectors, such as the public sector, the financial and banking sectors, and telecommunications. For us, we want to take the whole project and not leave a gray area for no person," he said. Industries for which local data residency is important, he said, "We have the answer and we give customers the choice."
Where is the data is no longer a criterion?
"For me, the data center is no longer a yardstick. Data center discussions take up 10% of my time these days, the rest of the time is spent on how to run a business, the complexities encountered, the challenges , mapping and surveying, and for clients to understand why they are moving," he said. It's a huge task to go from a four- or five-year-old technology to a futuristic technology, she said, adding that the data center was a great catalyst allowing local customers to move forward. to the cloud because they can extend beyond their geographies and environments. This can only be done via the internet and the cloud. "Business issues have become critical, and digital transformation has become a much bigger issue than data localization. What Oracle does differently than its competitors and only Oracle can do is offer end-to-end solutions. ", said. In the old days, he said Oracle was selling the CD and leaving it, but now "we're selling it, fixing it, deploying it, running it, upgrading it, and securing it. So you've got a neck to choke if something's wrong. We're in business." service now."
40% of its income comes from the installed base.
Oracle gets 40% of its revenue from the installed base and the rest from new customers. "If I have to convert my 4,000 customers to the cloud, I don't need to look outside. There's a lot to do from the inside," he said. "Our strategy is to make sure there are more installed databases available in the cloud. We are reshaping to do more and why more? We got the foundation today and the big names started today. "The cloud renewal rate is in its The highest level and it's the key measure for us today," he said. Further, he said Oracle could do more because it had more skills on the ground, more people on the ground, and more references to show that it did it three years ago." During the economic recession of 2007, we carried out more activities than in previous years. Businesses were moving to the next level of automation because they were short on internal time due to slow activity. Also this year, we expect this to happen as companies look at their operating costs more than before," he said.
More than 1.100 applications in the cloud.
At Dubai Internet City, Oracle is offering a Future Lab where customers can get a taste of how it will work in the cloud if they come with their data. "They can see the proof of concept locally in a matter of hours, instead of what would normally take six to seven weeks." "We're reducing the cost of ownership from 30% to 37%, without adding overhead," he said. Khekar boasts that he has all of Oracle's 1,100+ applications in the cloud and that no provider has Oracle's length and breadth. The American giant is expected to open its next data center in Saudi Arabia this year. "Saudi Arabia needs a data center because of the regulated industries and we want to make sure our checklist is complete," he said.