To stay competitive and agile in today’s data-driven world, organizations must bridge the gap between raw data and actionable insights. This requires not just collecting information, but also leveraging advanced reporting tools that transform complex data into meaningful, real-time analytics. 

SplashBI, a business analytics platform, offers organizations with solutions to boost their reporting and data capabilities from pre-built reports, data integration, data models, security, cloud or on-premise offerings. 

How the City of Tampa revolutionized reporting with SplashBI for Oracle Cloud

The City of Tampa, Florida, sought out a clear and comprehensive view of their expenditures and activities. To achieve this, the City’s administrators chose to move from their legacy Oracle EBS to Oracle Fusion Cloud. 

Transitioning from the legacy systems, however, was not easy and brought on many complexities such as limited reporting formats, data inconsistencies, and steep learning curves for the City’s users. The City required advanced ad hoc reporting, more specifically for grants and budget utilization, which the legacy solution failed to provide. As a result, the City then reached out to SplashBI to help with the migration to Oracle Fusion Cloud.

To aid the City in its transition to Oracle Fusion Cloud, SplashBI developed over 500 pre-built reports, ten custom reports and implemented real-time reporting capabilities tailored to the City’s needs. The platform upgrade ensured compatibility with the City’s new Oracle Fusion Cloud environment, and ultimately set the stage for the implementation of SplashBI for Oracle Cloud. 

The implementation was completed in ten weeks with no downtime which ensured business workflows operated seamlessly. Additionally, the upgrade enhanced transparency and operational efficiency which enabled the City’s users to gain access to insights independently. 

What does this mean for ERP insiders?

Migrating to Oracle Fusion Cloud offers businesses the opportunity to modernize their operations, enhance transparency, and unlock the full potential of their data. By addressing the limitations of legacy systems, organizations can benefit from advanced reporting capabilities, real-time insights, and streamlined workflows, all of which are critical for maintaining a competitive edge in today’s fast-paced environment.

SplashBI helps to ensure these transitions are seamless and effective. With its robust suite of pre-built reports, tailored customization, real-time reporting, and user-friendly design, SplashBI empowers organizations to leverage the power of Oracle Fusion Cloud. As demonstrated by the City of Tampa’s success, SplashBI not only simplifies the migration process but also equips users with the tools needed to drive efficiency, make data-driven decisions, and achieve organizational goals. 

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For Tomás O’Leary, CEO and founder at Origina, this patch-dependent approach is like driving a car with worn brake pads i.e. you know they need replacing. Still, you’re continuing to operate at full speed, hoping nothing forces you to make an emergency stop.

Origina is a global independent software maintenance vendor for IBM, HCL and VMware with a dedicated team of 600+ independent product experts working proactively to protect, extend and enhance all versions of IBM, HCL and VMware perpetually licensed software, providing a cost-intelligent alternative to traditional software vendor support.

An uncomfortable truth

“The uncomfortable truth is that the traditional ‘wait for a patch’ mentality is fundamentally flawed. Not only do organizations remain vulnerable during the often lengthy period it takes vendors to create patches, but in many cases, patches might never materialize at all. This statement is particularly true for end-of-support software, where vendors typically stop providing security fixes altogether,” said O’Leary.

He reminds us that the risks of patch dependency are stark.

According to Statista, the average cost per data breach reached $4.88 million in 2024, up from $4.45 million the previous year. These escalating costs reflect a troubling reality: traditional patch-based security approaches are failing to keep pace with modern threats. When critical vulnerabilities are discovered, every day spent waiting for a patch represents another day of exposure to potential attacks.

O’Leary says that the solution isn’t to abandon patches entirely, but rather to implement a layered, proactive approach to security – and several practical strategies have proven effective.

Practical strategies

“For instance, the most underutilized yet effective security measure is software product hardening, which involves configuring and optimizing your software to minimize potential attack surfaces,” said O’Leary. “Analysis from Origina’s security team shows that proper hardening can prevent up to 85% of known vulnerabilities from being exploited, without requiring source code modifications. We’ve seen organizations reduce their attack surface by 60% through basic hardening techniques like removing unnecessary services, implementing strict access controls, and configuring secure defaults. These measures can be implemented immediately, without waiting for vendor intervention.”

He notes that virtual patching proves especially valuable when critical vulnerabilities emerge in customized systems.

For example (and drawing from experience working with Origina customers), when a global telecom company discovered their systems were exposed to a critical vulnerability with 100% exposure risk, they couldn’t wait for traditional patches that might disrupt their customized configurations. Instead, they implemented virtual patching as an immediate protective measure, maintaining both security and system stability while avoiding the risks of rushing emergency patches into production.

“Waiting for official vendor notifications isn’t enough in today’s threat landscape. Organizations need access to real-time threat intelligence and vulnerability advisories from multiple sources. Building out this capability includes monitoring dark web activities and emerging threat patterns,” confirmed O;Leary. “By combining machine-driven intelligence with human analysis, organizations can identify and mitigate potential threats before they are exploited.”

O’Leary further reminds us that the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre warns that AI is lowering the barrier for cybercriminals to carry out effective attacks, with threat actors already using AI-powered language models to write malicious code. This enhanced access will likely contribute to the global ransomware threat over the next two years. Meanwhile, Cybersecurity Ventures predicts that cybercrime will cost the world $9.5 trillion in 2024, equivalent to the world’s third-largest economy after the U.S. and China.

Building a comprehensive security strategy

“A comprehensive security strategy must be contextual, understanding your specific environment and business needs. It should be risk-based, prioritizing actions according to threat likelihood and potential impact. Most importantly, it must embrace a defense-in-depth approach, which implements multiple layers of security controls that work together to protect your assets,” explained O’Leary. “The modern threat landscape demands a fundamentally different approach to security. When threat actors are using AI to accelerate and amplify their attacks, organizations can’t afford to move at the speed of vendor patch cycles. Robust, multilayered defense must become the new standard, including encryption, security hardening, and virtual patching.”

It appears then, that the stakes couldn’t be higher.

From the Origina team’s perspective, every day spent waiting for a patch is a day your organization remains exposed. The cost of inaction or inadequate protection continues to climb. The traditional reactive security model, built around patch dependency, is increasingly putting organizations at risk.

“A modern security posture demands a proactive, multilayered approach that combines threat intelligence, system hardening, and virtual protection. The tools and expertise exist to defend against today’s sophisticated threats – but they require a fundamental shift from reactive patch dependency to proactive security resilience,” concluded Origina’s O’Leary. “Ultimately, your organization’s security shouldn’t depend on a vendor’s patching schedule; it should be built on a foundation of continuous, comprehensive protection.”

Ultimately – perhaps somewhere towards the end of this current decade – when we get to a point where we can say “hey, remember reactive patch dependency?” as it it were some kind of archaic malpractice, then we will know that we have moved onwards progressively and effectively. At least, thanks to Origina and others, we’re saying it out loud now so that we can start to do something about it.

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It’s a big investment for customers to travel to Las Vegas and the location alone doesn’t sit well with management who have to pre-approve a potentially $6k trip when so many more mediums of education and engagement now exist. The investment IS worth it, though. There is some great quality content to take back to the office and implement, be that from a technical point of view or simply how to “work better”.

It’s very easy to attend a conference and drive in the middle of the road, attend sessions that tick the ERP/HCM/SCM and Tech boxes – but there is so much more value to be uncovered at CloudWorld. Take for example the Global Industry Unit offerings (recently known as GBU), a favorite being the depth and breadth of specialist coverage for Financial Services. I sat down with Mark Atherton (Global Head of Oracle Financial Services Analytical Applications) and speaking with him it became clear to me that other ERP vendors stick in the middle lane when it comes to true value add in areas such as core banking. Similar areas worth looking at are construction and retail, very popular specific core solutions used by millions daily but often overlooked.

Data Security in the Cloud

Oracle meant serious business this year. Yes there was plenty of party atmosphere at the evening celebration event, but there was one very clear message: that of security of your data. I lost count of how many Oracle presenters had prior careers with the CIA or FBI.  One impressive presentation hosted by Agnieszka Bruyère (VP EMEA Public Sector and Defence) focussed on the investment Oracle have made in securing data centers for use in government. Meanwhile, Rob Duhart (SVP, Cloud Security), and ex-US government security leader, manages a team of nearly 800 with the remit of maintaining walls around what you need protecting the most. But keeping the lights on is only half of the story, with the future threat and the potential of “unregulated external GenAI” keeping Rob and his team on 24/7 alert.

Another underlooked complimentary suite from Oracle is Analytics. Visitors of the Wonderwall Analytics area at CloudWorld got to hear about two noteworthy developments:

People Leader Workbench and Supply Chain Command Center: Two new intelligent applications have been added. The People Leader Workbench aims to assist HR and finance teams in aligning talent strategies with business goals. Some serious value add here allowing for strategic people control and planning alongside the already well established Strategic Workforce Management.

The Supply Chain Command Center helps organizations respond to dynamic supply chain conditions with intelligent recommendations. Also of particular interest is the Developer Assistant with Generative AI, a new AI-powered Developer Assistant introduced to streamline the configuration of Oracle Fusion Data Intelligence services. It guides developers through adding third-party data sources and configuring analytics setups, leveraging generative AI to simplify these processes.

Multicloud Partnerships: If you haven’t already heard, Oracle announced a significant expansion of its multicloud strategy, highlighting new partnerships with AWS, Google, and Microsoft. The partnership with AWS includes Oracle Exadata Database Service running on AWS and new seamless data movement capabilities. This underscores Oracle’s commitment to making multicloud solutions more integrated and efficient for its customers. After all, it wasn’t that long ago when Larry Ellison infamously stated:  “The computer industry is the only industry that is more fashion-driven than women’s fashion. Maybe I’m an idiot, but I have no idea what anyone is talking about. What is it? It’s complete gibberish. It’s insane. When is this idiocy going to stop?”

Let’s be clear, Larry is no idiot. He was right; the cloud has been overhyped in general terms where it’s just software stored on someone else’s computer. However the purest skill of Oracle is developing and maintaining SaaS and On-Premises applications and a tech tool kit to make other vendors weep.

The Oracle roadmap is clear; where once competitive, the future is multi-cloud. Larry discussed the importance of multicloud interoperability, emphasizing that the future of cloud computing lies in better integration between different cloud providers. He highlighted Oracle’s efforts to create interconnected cloud environments that allow customers to leverage the best services from multiple providers.

The outlook for Oracle as a vendor, its ecosystem, customer success is very strong; the messages are clear and understood. Transformation is a journey and Oracle is there for you.

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While seeing consistent growth over the quarter, Oracle generally underperformed compared to analysts’ estimates with Q2 total revenue of $14.1bn, up 9 percent, and issued a weaker-than-expected forecast.

The company has the uneasy task of competing with hyperscalers Microsoft, AWS and Google Cloud which are currently dominating the field with notable presence, especially in AI.

While it may not have rebranded itself as the AI ERP and cloud choice du jour just yet, Big Red believes it’s on a growth trajectory amid soaring demand for computing power that can handle artificial intelligence projects. CEO Safra Catz shared that “record level AI demand drove Oracle Cloud Infrastructure revenue up 52 percent in Q2, a much higher growth rate than any of our hyperscale cloud infrastructure competitors.” 

“Growth in the AI segment of our Infrastructure business was extraordinary – GPU consumption was up 336 percent in the quarter – and we delivered the world’s largest and fastest AI SuperComputer,” the CEO added.

In line with this AI enthusiasm, Oracle announced it has signed a deal with Facebook parent Meta for the social media giant to use Oracle Cloud to enhance the training and deployment of its Llama LLM family.

The news comes several months after Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI and Oracle ended talks on a potential $10bn server deal, due to disagreements over timeline and power supply concerns, as reported by Reuters in July.

Larry Ellison, Oracle chairman and CTO, explained more about the company’s training potential in the earnings call: “Oracle Cloud Infrastructure trains several of the world’s most important generative AI models [OpenAI, xAI, Nvidia, Cohere] because we are faster and less expensive than other clouds […] Oracle is training AI models and developing AI agents that will improve the rate of scientific discovery and economic development and corporate growth throughout the world. The scale of this opportunity is unimaginable.”

Oracle’s infrastructure cloud services have now reached an annualized revenue of 9.7bn while OCI consumption revenue was up 58 percent as demand continues to outstrip supply,” Catz added.

The company’s remaining performance obligation (RPO) is up 50 percent to $97bn, driving its positivity that growth rates will continue to climb. “This fiscal year, total Oracle Cloud revenue should top $25bn,” the CTO predicted – time will tell if this particular oracle is right.

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By reinforcing their partnership and expanding geographically to Canada and Europe in 2025, the duo is adding value to users across key industries, including telco, technology, financial services, education and retail.

A new connector makes possible a simple use of multimodal models developed and trained on Amazon Bedrock for GenAI‑powered workflows in the Now Platform. Connecting Amazon Bedrock models to ServiceNow can help enterprises boost the development and deployment of GenAI solutions.

 The new connector also helps users to connect to their choice of third‑party models, according to their specific workflow needs, such as summarization, advanced analytics or code generation. Data remains private and secure through ServiceNow and AWS, with a straightforward integration.

Paul Fipps, president of strategic accounts at ServiceNow, said the partnership with AWS is accelerating business transformation: “More than ever before, organizations demand integrated, end‑to‑end solutions that enhance user experiences and optimize technology investments. Together, ServiceNow’s GenAI workflows and AWS’ next‑gen cloud capabilities deliver on that promise.”

“We are committed to empowering our customers with the industry’s best tools and resources by leveraging AWS Marketplace to build, deploy and scale GenAI,” said Chris Grusz, managing director of technology partnerships at AWS. 

Additional automation solutions and integrations are available on the AWS Marketplace to manage security incidents and procurement.

The announcement follows up on ServiceNow and AWS’ continued collaboration, bringing the advanced cloud capabilities of AWS to the solutions on the Now Platform. A range of global enterprise customers, including Boomi,  Bell Canada and Pearson are already seeing value and cost savings using these capabilities.

Ed Macosky, chief product and technology officer at Boomi, said that leveraging the ServiceNow for AWS offering supports their mission to boost business outcomes: “This collaboration enables us to harness the full power of AI, streamline our workflows and enhance digital experiences across our organization. We are not only realizing significant cost savings but also transforming our GenAI workflows to drive innovation.”

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The announcement stated that by adopting IFS Cloud with Teamcenter, the Siemens product lifecycle management (PLM) solution, one of the oldest aircraft manufacturers aims to transition towards paperless production and assembly, leveraging advanced shop floor digital twin technology and visualization tools. 

Additionally, spokespersons shared that implementing IFS Cloud with Teamcenter will enable the standardization of processes and align the company with industry best practices. This holistic approach will therefore optimize production efficiency, reduce errors and ensure consistent quality across all operations.

“We are making one of the largest IT investments in Aero’s history. We are acquiring the best of the best in the world of enterprise software solutions and at the same time introducing a system for product lifecycle management,” said Viktor Sotona, chairman of the board and president of Aero. “This significant investment is a key step towards digitalization, future growth and increased competitiveness of our company.”

In the future, the companies hope that the new solution built from tightly integrated ERP and PLM will form a digital backbone for all of Aero’s operations. That includes the development, design and manufacture of aircraft, components and composite parts for other aircraft manufacturers.

Marek Głazowski, managing director at IFS, also commented on the announcement: “We are thrilled to be supporting Aero on their transformation journey. The company has a well-established heritage in a complex industry that we are proud to have a deep understanding of. 

“We look forward to partnering with Aero to achieve value fast and accelerate their growth through simplifying and upgrading legacy systems with state-of-the-art ERP and PLM systems from IFS and Siemens.”

Pavel Rozsypal, an account orchestrator at Siemens, added: “[…] Our advanced PLM solutions, combined with IFS Cloud’s ERP capabilities, will empower Aero to not only enhance their production workflows but also accelerate their innovation cycles, helping them maintain a competitive edge in the global aerospace market.”

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The progression of the longstanding SAP and BBC partnership is part of the BBC’s continued digital transformation journey. The BBC aims to utilize RISE with SAP capabilities to simplify services while also inducing more cost-effective methods for the broadcaster to run its IT systems.

Previously, RISE with SAP was used to replace the BBC’s older model – which still used separate contracts for the use of data centers and software licenses, the use of which required annual maintenance via support fees for services. By reducing the complexity and effort required to maintain IT systems, the BBC hopes to internally realign to work towards more innovative experiences for its audience.

“By simplifying our IT services, we can focus on running our business and ensure we’re meeting the needs of our viewers and listeners,” said Peter O’Kane, CTO, BBC.

“We want to make sure we’re investing the most we can in services for audiences.”

Managing director of SAP UK and Ireland, Leila Romane, said that the progression of the partnership is an integral moment in the “BBC’s aim to streamline its business operations.”

“We are delighted to partner with the BBC and our solutions, backed by the security and availability of the AWS Cloud, means the BBC has the ideal foundation to deliver on its promise to serve all audiences,” Romane said.

Speaking from an AWS perspective, VP and managing director of EMEA, AWS, Tanuja Randery, was prepared and ready for another RISE with SAP integration. “We’re delighted that the BBC has chosen to move its critical SAP business systems to run on AWS,” Randery said.

“Our proven track record in delivering high-performance, secure, and scalable cloud services aligns perfectly with the BBC’s needs and enables them to improve performance, increase resilience and reliability, and accelerate their digital transformation journey with confidence.”

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Raphael Erb, who stepped into the CEO role last month, following Brian Duffy’s stint, said that despite the company’s very solid foundation, “our third-quarter results were disappointing. This was due to a combination of factors, including the rushed implementation of our new go-to-market (GTM) model, which led to sales execution issues impacting our ability to effectively respond to changed vendor incentives, as we have done in the past.”

In early 2024, SoftwareOne introduced its global GTM transformation to better align sales resources with the needs of its different client segments and to drive sales productivity. However, the company has now admitted that the accelerated implementation of the GTM model in July across key markets hindered its ability to effectively respond to vendor incentive shifts, as well as seeing more cautious customer spending behavior in key markets.

The company’s revenue increased 3.1 percent at constant currency to 236.7m Swiss francs ($268.5m). Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization dropped nearly 16 percent at constant currency to 39.2m Swiss francs, seeing a 16.6 percent adjusted margin.

Under the leadership of the new CEO, the company reassured that “broad and decisive action has been taken to mitigate the immediate impact, generate new sales pipeline and resolve the issues as swiftly as possible”.

At the same time, Erb confirmed his confidence in the GTM model as the right approach. “We have identified the execution issues and our top priority is to fix them, while adjusting our roll-out plans for the remaining markets.”

SoftwareOne’s CFO Rodolfo Savitzky, added that “with operational excellence and the GTM concept, we have built a solid foundation and now the focus must be fully on execution. 

“We already see progress in many areas such as the significant improvement in contribution margin, and our goal now is to extend the strong execution to all areas of the company.”

Looking ahead, he said that the company will also be further adjusting its cost structure to reflect the renewed focus on client centricity, “targeting over CHF 50 million in annual savings by H1 2025, of which CHF 17 million are expected to be realized in Q4 2024”.

Another major development for SoftwareOne is that the company said it is currently in talks with interested parties over a potential going-private deal. The Board of Directors is to present an offer to shareholders or conclude discussions by February 2025, in line with FY2024 results.

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According to the spokespersons, this acquisition reinforces Sage’s commitment to supporting SMBs and users will now be able to effectively track portfolios, budgets, opportunities, contacts, team collaboration, calendar tasks, video calls and performance in a comprehensive, AI-enhanced mobile solution.

Already part of the Sage partner ecosystem, ForceManager is a global company that operates in Europe, the UK and North and South America. ForceManager will continue to be available as a standalone solution for both Sage and non-Sage customers.

“ForceManager’s high-level technology, available in several Sage solutions in Spain and the UK, together with the talent of colleagues joining Sage, confirms our strategy of delivering sustainable and efficient growth for businesses through innovation and investment in AI,” said José Luis Martín Zabala, managing director of Sage Iberia.

Oscar Maciá, CEO of ForceManager, also commented on the announcement: “When we launched ForceManager, we recognized the immense value of integrating sales processes with companies’ transactional systems and unifying management platforms. This level of integration is crucial to driving business productivity. 

“Now, joining forces with Sage […] presents an incredible opportunity to empower millions of SMBs to increase sales and achieve greater business success.”

Among other news, Sage has acquired New York-based technology firm Anvyl. According to the announcement, the latter’s focus on the $20bn supply chain software sector will augment Sage’s capabilities, allowing it to cost-effectively deliver supply chain execution (SCE) and provide SMBs with visibility from purchase order creation to warehouse delivery.

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According to the spokespersons, the new solution combines ServiceNow’s single architecture and data model with Rimini Street’s enterprise software support to accelerate customer innovation across procurement, finance, supply chain, HR, customer service and IT.

Rimini Street and ServiceNow’s new enterprise software model promises to produce significant savings and fuel innovation, improved user experiences and AI-driven productivity gains in under a year.

“Twentieth-century systems have created a mess of complexity that hinders 21st-century innovation,” said Bill McDermott, chairman and chief executive officer at ServiceNow. 

“ServiceNow’s partnership with Rimini Street gives customers a more unified, intelligent platform to maximize their existing software investments, for faster paths to transformation. Together, we are enabling a brighter future where technology unlocks unprecedented potential.”

Seth Ravin, chairman and chief executive officer at Rimini Street, also commented on the announcement: “We are excited to bring organizations this new enterprise software model that enables maximized ROI on their current enterprise software investments, integrates disconnected and siloed landscapes of enterprise software and frees up funding for innovation. 

“This new partnership truly brings together the best of ServiceNow innovation and Rimini Street enterprise software support capabilities to solve this common – but complex – IT challenge.”

Some of the key improvements and innovations promised to the users include Rimini Street’s support of the Now Platform through its certified ServiceNow team and management of the existing enterprise software foundation, as well as the replacement of software vendor maintenance from traditional licensed software to third-party support, leading to optimization, annual support fee savings, improved service levels, full coverage for customizations and no required upgrades or migration for a minimum of 15 years. 

Additionally, Rimini Manage functionality will manage and run traditional on-premise licensed software and SaaS applications, either by itself or with vendor replacement third-party support. The solution promises to relieve IT departments from the day-to-day software operating and support tasks to enable focus on driving innovation and value for the enterprise.

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