Oracle to acquire SDN start-up Corente

Oracle adds software-defined networking technology to complement cloud computing offerings

Oracle is to acquire software-defined networking (SDN) technology provider Corente.

Financial terms for the deal were not disclosed, which should close later this year.

According to Oracle, Corente will help Oracle customers to improve the way they deploy cloud applications by enabling them to provision and manage global private networks connecting to any site.

The company which was founded in 2007 offers its customers a "cloud services exchange" product, which delivers distributed applications over networks to any site.

In the document outlining the acquisition, Oracle said: "Together, Corente and Oracle are expected to deliver a complete technology portfolio for cloud deployments with SDN offerings that virtualise both the enterprise data centre local area network (LAN) and the wide-area network, dramatically decreasing time to deployment of services and increasing security and manageability across the enterprise ecosystem."

In other words, Oracle plans to mesh together cloud computing infrastructure and SDN, enabling customers to set up networks quickly and connect their on-premise data centres with Oracle's public cloud. It hopes this will be an attractive proposition for existing and prospective customers.

The deal follows Oracle's 2012 acquisition of network virtualisation firm Xsigo and means that Oracle could be shaping up to compete with the likes of Cisco and VMware, who have both already made clear their intentions to compete in the premature SDN market.

However, some critics have questioned Oracle's acquisition strategy, arguing that little has been seen or heard of Xsigo, for example, since its purchase by Oracle.