Oracle, The Recession and You

Sometimes good isn’t good enough. Profits are up at Oracle. And so are software sales. But the improvements fell short of Wall Street’s expectations, which has The VAR Guy worried. He turned off his laptop to escape from depressing online chatter — only to find the latest InformationWeek on his kitchen table. The cover story: “Recession and You.” Ouch.

No, this isn’t 2000 or 2001 all over again. During the dot-com bubble, a lot of customers were money-losing organizations that had no clear path to profitability. Today, IT sales to profitable enterprises continue to grow–though not as fast as we all hoped.

In its most recent quarter, Oracle’s new software sales rose 16 percent — but financial pundits were expecting growth of about 20 percent, according to Reuters.

Alas, this is going to sting quite a bit folks. Oracle shares dropped 8 percent on the news. Over in the hardware sector, soft results from one of Cisco’s key electronics suppliers also has investors nervous.

Time for The VAR Guy to run for cover. He’s unplugging tonight and heading to CostCo. Where else can he drown his financial misery in a 20 gallon tub of ice cream for less than the price of a gallon of gas?

(Kidding aside, The VAR Guy isn’t ready to press the panic button. He actually sees upbeat channel trends, particularly in the managed services market. And remember: Oracle’s sales grew, PC sales continue to grow … lots of IT markets are growing. Still, our resident blogger needs a break from all of these economic indicators.)