Oracle gets serious about the cloud

Oracle has entered into an agreement to acquire Corente, a provider of software-defined networking (SDN) technology for wide area networks (WANs). Corente reports its WAN virtualization platform accelerates deployment of cloud-based applications and services by allowing customers to provision and manage global private networks connecting to any site, in a secure, centralized and simple manner.

Corente and Oracle are expected to deliver a complete technology portfolio for cloud deployments with SDN offerings that virtualize both the enterprise data center LAN and the WAN, dramatically decreasing time to deployment of services and increasing security and manageability across the enterprise ecosystem. Oracle expects the deal to close in the early part of 2014, subject to regulatory approval, according to a presentation on the company’s website. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

It is at least the third major purchase of a cloud-based platform for Oracle. In 2012, it purchased Taleo, a maker of online human resources software, for $1.9 billion. In 2011, it acquired RightNow Technologies, a provider of Web-based customer service software, for $1.43 billion.