Where are your Oracle support fees going?

Customer frustrations with Oracle support have long been documented.

A survey in 2021 found that 83% of Oracle Database license holders found their prices to be ‘excessive’ or ‘too much’, while 41% are actively trying to reduce their Oracle footprint over time because of this.

When asked to elaborate, participants also cited a lack of ROI with required upgrades that were needed just to maintain support, as per Business Wire.

With customers paying as much as 22% (+4% standard annual increase) of the license cost, they can be forgiven for expecting substantial reinvestment back into their support that improves the service.

That would be a true customer-centric approach. But that isn’t what appears to be happening in the case of Oracle support fees.

For a service designed to ‘support’ the customer, it can often feel like organisations are receiving anything but support from the vendor.

Hiding license support revenues behind Cloud numbers – ‘Cloud services and license support’ – is a prime example.

This revenue category made up over 70% of its overall revenue in 2022, according to information from Statista! This means they make most of their revenue just from the support and services they provide around the product.

When revenue generation is so heavily focused on the support and not the product, it makes you wonder how much of their focus is on creating a better product for the customer.

Take their recent expensive sponsorships with the Premier League and Red Bull F1 as an example.

Much of that 90%+ profit margin they’re making from organisations on support isn’t going back on improving the service, it’s going on flashy marketing like this to promote its Cloud business.

In fact, flashy marketing seems to continually take a precedent over support service improvements.

These support fees are ploughed back into multiple marketing partnerships such as:

• Larry Ellison’s sailing team ‘Oracle Team USA’.
• San Francisco Giants’ stadium ‘Oracle Park’ (Baseball).
• The Golden State Warriors performance centre (Basketball).
• Seattle Sounders F.C partnership (Football).

You might not receive a resolution from your ticket, but at least Larry Ellison gets to compete in the next America’s Cup, right?

This is particularly pertinent when IT budgets are being further squeezed and purchasing power is eroded by rising inflation.

It’s becoming harder and harder to justify the cost of Oracle support when its leadership are continually pushing its customers further down the queue, favouring style over substance.

A quality-focused alternative

Luckily, organisations are becoming increasingly aware of alternative third-party support options offering what Oracle should have from the very beginning.

At Support Revolution we aren’t looking to make a 90% profit margin from out customers so can offer the support Oracle provide, and more, while guaranteeing at least a 50% cost-saving in the process.

Find out more about how the quality of Oracle’s support is slipping, and how it’s favouring big brand deals in our guide.