Virgin Mobile locks in Oracle Exadata
SingTel Optus subsidiary Virgin Mobile Australia has selected Oracle's Exadata kit as it presses ahead with its massive operational restructure.
"We are overhauling our data warehouse infrastructure to provide the underlying support for our growth plans, and help us continue to shake things up in the Australian mobile market," said Gajan Ramanathan, Business Intelligence Manager, Virgin Mobile Australia.
Virgin Mobile is the second Australian company to have purchased Oracle's Database Machine V2, right on the heels of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, which brought in the hardware-software combination for its online transaction processing (OLTP) requirements late last year.
Oracle previously installed Exadata software on HP hardware, however during its US$7 billion acquisition of Sun Microsystems last year, it moved to package its software with Sun hardware.
The company itself has expressed excitement about the product combination. At its third quarter March US earnings update, Oracle President Charles Phillips claimed Exadata was the company's fastest growing product in the company's history and that its global sales pipeline was now approaching $400 million.
Virgin Mobile is also part way through a restructure of its local operations, recently making the call to move a large chunk of its 400 strong workforce to parent company SingTel Optus.
Virgin Mobile last week confirmed to ZDNet.com.au it would move 100 staff to Optus' Macquarie Park campus, ending their employment at North Sydney. An unspecified number of IT support staff are included in the move, which was expected to be complete by May.
While support, logistics and its warehouse will move to Optus, strategy roles and Virgin Mobile's chief information officer Nigel Grange will remain at its headquarters.
Virgin Mobile's Ramanathan said he was impressed by the product because it came pre-configured and pre-integrated.