As a student of history I went and listened to Henry Kissinger once. He said before World War I there was a tremendous amount of prosperity in the western world but everyone new war was coming. He said there was no reason for World War I to ever have occurred but everyone at that time knew it was inevitable.

If you look at the IT industry today and the different acquisitions that are occurring you can start to see how the competitors and strategies are lining up. Here are a number of the key groups that will define direction and have an impact on where the IT industry is going. I picked these due to their capability to act as change agents:

• Oracle - Database server, middleware, applications.
• IBM - Database server, middleware, professional services.
• SAP - Applications.
• Microsoft - Operating systems and software.
• Sun, HP and Dell - Hardware and professional services.
• Internet companies - Google, Yahoo, YouTube, MySpace, etc.
• Open Source - The companies, products and initiatives of the community.
  
• Web 2.0 - Wikis, Blogs, Social networks, Mashups, etc.
  
• The Internet - The power of connectivity and access.
• Startup companies - The fuel for the Internet.

As I said previously, 2008 is going to be a very interesting year. I'm especially interested in the database and middleware arena. New features and releases coming out towards the second half of 2008 is going to create some very interesting redirections of the IT industry.

As an Oracle DBA or developer where do you see yourself in this Internet picture? Also, how are your skills evolving to stay marketable in this changing world?

This may be an interesting year of acquisitions. Oracle's purchase of BEA and Sun's purchase of MySQL are definitely starting the year out with a bang. Red Hat's purchase of JBoss is also going to be interesting. As the Internet and open source continue to evolve daily, we can definitely expect more fireworks in 2008.

Oracle right now seems to be the master of acquisitions. Oracle has proven the great ability to successfully integrate the companies they purchase. From the purchases of J.D. Edwards, Siebel, PeopleSoft, Retek, Hyperion, etc. we can expect that Oracle has a strong integration strategy for BEA. The winners are going to be Oracle customers and middleware technologists. With the power of the core of WebLogic and AquaLogic being added to Oracle's middle tier, it will add a lot of power to Oracle as it goes toe to toe with IBM for the enterprise middleware space.

From a pure technoogy view, this is a great move for Oracle. For how much Oracle paid for BEA and what Oracle will do with BEA, I'll leave it to the industry analysts and wall street to determine if it was a good purchase. I've been busy enough on the Oracle side with the BPEL process manager, SOA Suite, XML and JDeveloper platform, I'm getting a headache thinking about WebLogic and AquaLogic. Does anybody else feel their head leaking when they think about middleware. The year 2007 was a banner year for Oracle acquisitions. It will be fun to see what Oracle does in 2008.

Today, January 16, 2008, Oracle announced an agreement to acquire BEA Systems, Inc. This is sure to bring new innovativeness to the strong middleware position Oracle currently has with Oracle Fusion Middleware. BEA is a strong leader in the middleware space. With this purchase we can all expect acceleration of the SOA and Java-based technologies Oracle is currently offering today. The interoperability of Oracle Fusion Middleware and BEA will offer customers more options and flexibility with middleware solutions in the future.

The middle-tier is playing an increasing role in database architectures with identity management, SOA, BPEL, XML and Java based applications. As customers requirements become more complex, the increased options and flexibility that this acquisition will bring is important to Oracle customers. This brings the power of Oracle's BI purchases such as Hyperion and the Web 2.0 and the SOA stack that BEA has. Instead of looking at this as Oracle purchasing BEA, it is also important to also look at the new stew ingredients that Oracle and BEA have with Hyperion, Web 2.0 components, AquaLogic, XML, SOA stacks, etc. When you look at the ingredients as if a stew is being put together, the components of this stew mix that Oracle and BEA can now set on the table is pretty interesting to middleware enthusiasts.