Oracle targets small firms with application bundles

Oracle has unveiled a new channel business unit that will sell packages of its applications that have been specially designed for small businesses.

The database giant is rolling out 80 product and industry-specific bundles based on its Oracle E-business Suite, JDEdwards and Peoplesoft products.

Oracle president Charles Phillips, said: "The introduction of Oracle Accelerate makes it faster and easier for customers and partners to leverage Oracle's leading enterprise applications."

The bundles feature 'Business Accelerators' – an automated setup tool that captures responses to simple questions about specific business requirements and then automatically applies that information to the application implementation.

On the partner side Oracle is opening up its direct sales information to partners through expanded SMB content on its Oracle PartnerNetwork portal.

"This new SMB-specific content provides partners with valuable resources used by Oracle’s own direct sales team, ensuring that partners are equipped with the up-to-date tools to sell Oracle software and effectively compete in the SMB space," the firm said.

Separately at its OpenWorld conference in San Francisco, Oracle announced it is buying comms and media industry software house MetaSolv Software in a $219 million stock swap. The firm provides operations support systems which support VoIP, IPTV, IP VPN, broadband and mobile services, as well as traditional voice and data services.