back to article London councils splurge wildly differing amounts on Oracle software

The vast majority of London Councils use Oracle as their ERP provider, but some bodies are splashing out less than £15,000 while others are forking out £500,000, according to research. The findings were based on Freedom of Information responses sent to enterprise IT business TmaxSoft, which quizzed 27 councils. Of those, 92 …

  1. A Non e-mouse Silver badge

    User count

    User count is kind of an important figure to have when comparing these numbers. Without that, they are just numbers with no real meaning.

    1. BearishTendencies

      Re: User count

      That and what 'an Oracle licence' is would help. And what applications are then run on it. Which will differ widely.

      Third time a variant of this story has been run (at least). Central government, then police, now local government. It was nonsense first time. It's still nonsense.

      1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

        Re: User count

        I agree. Anyone paying Oracle or Microsoft to rob them is nonsense.

  2. Joeman

    Why does anyone still bother to use Oracle anyway??

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Why does anyone still bother to use Oracle anyway??

      For some jobs there's nothing else that can handle the workload.

      1. organiser

        The article probably refer to Oracle EBS (E-Business Suite), their ERP system, while you seem to refer to the database. IBM DB2 runs some of the largest databases in the world. There is nothing else that can handle the workload.

  3. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

    Meaningless numbers

    There is no such thing as an "Oracle license", it's bound to vary with product, system size, number of users, etc. This is a little like pointing out that a "household" in Westminster spends less on, say, tea than a "household" in Birmingham, and ignoring the likely difference in household size and makeup.

    1. ToddR

      Re: Meaningless numbers

      I thought Oracle was licensed on a per core basis?

      1. BearishTendencies

        Re: Meaningless numbers

        Or user, or expense line, or PO line, or.....

        No context = non-story.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Meaningless numbers

        Which one of the many hundreds of SKUs are you referring to?

        Almost all Oracle software is available to be licensed as either on a per-core basis (with a minimum number of users per core) or on a named user basis. In almost every case it is cheaper to license production systems on a per-core basis and non-prod on named users.

        However, as others have pointed out, without specifying which products are being referred to this study is completely meaningless. Price list prices on products varies from less than $10k USD per core to $250k USD or more.

        It's like saying that some people pay more for a car than other people. If the council pays twice the price for a specific model of Ford Focus that would be news. To say that a council pays more for a lorry than a person pays for a car is not news.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Databases and what is doubtlessly my misunderstanding ...

    So, you require a robust database and you buy Oracle so you are paying to license software and services, but my question is why not use PostgreSQL or other opensource database and use the 100 thousand + in Oracle costs to higher a couple of good database administrators with expertise in that software to develop it. The money then stays in the community and you already have those administrators that work your Oracle database(s) who can learn the differences.

    1. ToddR

      Re: Databases and what is doubtlessly my misunderstanding ...

      Or a use this tool http://www.pontusvision.com/thread-manager-threadmanager/threadmanager-powerpoint-video/

      and do it for peanuts

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Databases and what is doubtlessly my misunderstanding ...

      The article refers to the licencing of Oracle ERP. i.e Applications such as Oracle Financials, Procurement, iExpenses. These are designed and configured to run on an Oracle database so PostgreSQL, whilst it could be used for in-house database uses wouldn't work behind Oracle eBusiness Suite.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Databases and what is doubtlessly my misunderstanding ...

      Have you tried to hire a PostgreSQL or other open source database admin at local authority pay scales?

      I have. It's not possible. People with those skills want to work elsewhere, people who work in local authorities are (for the most part) not interested in or not able to get the skills in these alternate applications.

  5. Ben1892

    Again with the non-story

    The same arguments were put forward with "How much do UK cops pay for Microsoft licences". Not comparing apples with apples and declaring a scandal. Why not do "total IT spend per head" or does that not have a big enough discrepancy to be a newsworthy article ?

  6. Richard Taylor 2
    Headmaster

    Good to see that Jeremy has been briefed in good time

  7. Buzzword

    Bottom line

    Interesting that both Westminster and K&C are top of the league tables for cheapest council tax nationwide. From which we conclude that using Oracle costs far more than the benefits it provides.

    1. BearishTendencies

      Re: Bottom line

      Or its that Westminster and Kensington and Chelsea have huge opportunities for collecting revenue from other souces of income due to their geographical and population advantages?

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    How is Munich doing?

    After all of the FUD the best I can gather is that they've been successful in getting an open source it system.

    Does El Reg have an update for this experiment?

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    you don't get kickbacks from open source...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Which open source ERP suite are we talking about?

      I'm not aware of any, but maybe I'm just not current.

      1. organiser

        OpenERP (www.openerp.com) is one.

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