Wall Street questions Oracle’s strategy after weak Q3 sales

SAN FRANCISCO, April 03: Oracle’s severe miss in quarterly sales, dismissed by management as a blip, amplified questions on Wall Street about the business-software giant’s diminishing clout in an industry moving rapidly toward cheaper Internet-based rivals. Senior management assured Wall Street that a worrying 2-percent slip in new software sales was mostly due to a sales force that lacked “urgency”, something to be addressed this quarter. Many analysts agreed, describing the decline in software and hardware revenues as a speed bump. Others say the dismal numbers highlight concerns that the strategy championed by the world’s No. 3 software maker, of integrating cloud software with its own hardware for greater efficiency, may not be enough to keep up with a growing number of rivals offering low-cost solutions.-DNA