NEWS DEALS &WINS Oracle delivers cloud for Uber in “landmark competitive win” for the vendor

BY STEPHANIE BALL

In a series of new and hefty contracts, Uber has announced a seven-year partnership with Oracle to drive new product innovations, modernize infrastructure and pump the accelerator on profitability.

The ride-hailing and delivery service goliath is set to migrate some of its most critical workloads to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) and Oracle will also become a global Uber for Business client.

Oracle CEO, Safra Catz, named the deal a “landmark competitive win for OCI” and said: “Uber is expanding into a ‘go anywhere, get anything’ platform, and the company needed a cloud partner that shares a relentless focus on innovation.

“This is further validation of the momentum and acceleration we are experiencing in the market. Enterprises, governments and startups around the world are recognizing the differentiation of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and experiencing our performance, security and economic benefits versus other hyperscalers.”

Back in December 2022, during Oracle’s fiscal second quarter announcement, chairman and CTO Larry Ellison hinted at the success of signing “multiple customers to infrastructure contracts exceeding $1bn”. By the size of Uber, and the landmark seal of approval issued by Catz, it’s unconfirmed, yet very likely, that this Uber contract is one of the mystery deals.

But like many other firms, Uber is refusing to put its entire technology shopping list into one digital basket. Its tech stack is cloud hopping with an additional seven-year contract signed simultaneously with Google Cloud, as well as a pre-existing deal with AWS , which allows the firm to stream real-time analytics with Redis, AWS Fargate and Dash framework.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has touted Oracle as the cloud provider that will deliver maximum innovation while reducing overall infrastructure costs. Uber and Oracle will also continue co-innovating on additional retail and delivery solutions, including last-mile logistics.

Meanwhile, Google has been earmarked as Uber’s go-to cloud provider to improve, reimagine and innovate the customer experience with Ads and the Google Maps Platform, data cloud technologies, AI, ML, security and microservices.

“Uber is revolutionizing the way people, products and services move across continents and through cities,” said Khosrowshahi. “To deliver on that promise for customers while building value for shareholders, we needed a cloud provider that will help us maximize innovation while reducing our overall infrastructure costs. Oracle provides an ideal combination of price, performance, flexibility and security to help us deliver incredible customer service, build new products and increase profitability.”

It’s a tech stack that is becoming more complex by the deal. But with Oracle, Google and AWS jostling in Uber’s backseat, it’s also a further endorsement of the multi-cloud strategy that is being adopted by many of the world’s digitally-native companies. Uber makes its living by moving people around the planet and this new technology deal will allow the firm greater flexibility to deliver improved customer experiences. The key challenge for Uber will be to focus on its own destination in a more complex cloud environment.