Oracle Corporation

 Basics

• The third-largest software corporation in the world, Oracle is famed for its eponymous database software.
• "What many do not know is that the “Oracle” name itself comes from the firm’s first customer: the CIA. “Project Oracle” was the CIA codename for a giant relational database that was being constructed on contract by Ampex, a Silicon Valley firm. Assigned to the project were Larry Ellison, Bob Miner and Ed Oates. Although Project Oracle “was something of a disaster” it did lead Ellison and his partners to spin off Oracle Corporation, which to this day gets 25% of its business from government contracts. Or take Sun Microsystems. Founded in 1982, the Silicon Valley software and hardware giant’s flagship Unix workstation, the “Sun-1”, as ComputerWorld explains, “owes its origins rather directly to a half-dozen major technologies developed at multiple universities and companies, all funded by ARPA" (Now DARPA). Sun was acquired by Oracle in 2010 for $7.4 billion."
• From Forbes Blockchain 50 (Apr 16, 2019):

"The database and cloud company is offering “business-ready” blockchain software in an effort to keep customers of its non-blockchain products from defecting to upstarts and rivals like Google and Microsoft. One of Oracle’s customers, China Distance Education Holdings, is sharing student educational records and professional certifications across institutions to help employers and recruiters verify that credentials aren’t fraudulent. Full profile"

• From Forbes Blockchain 50 (2-2-2021):

"The database giant launched its proprietary blockchain in 2018. Its most mature project is Global Shipping Business Network (GSBN), a maritime shipping consortium that now has 300 customers, including container-shipping giants and port operators."

 Main links 

• Has announced "it’s going to plug the data generated by 50 startups into a blockchain, for free. The idea is to help them unlock lucrative, new revenue streams. But smart contracts rarely operate in a vacuum. They need access to the real world data, a service performed by oracle providers. Hence Oracle has announced that—to deliver the monetizing potential of blockchain tech to startups— it’s collaborating with decentralized oracle provider, Chainlink. The company is building a reputation as the gatekeeper to real-world data, after Google announced it was collaborating with the oracle provider earlier this month—taking the company’s partnership tally to more than 30. Oracle will announce the names of the startups it will be working with at its annual event, Oracle Code One, in San Francisco, in September 2019. But in the interim its rolling out content to instruct others how to integrate Chainlink and Ethereum into cloud infrastructure. Perhaps most surprisingly, the code Oracle is rolling out to deploy the service will be open source, creating a bridge between Ethereum, Chainlink and a multitude of startups, that others could access and learn from."
• One of the sponsors (3-10-2019) of Hyperledger Avalon.

Current employees

• Key leader: Frank Xiong, group vice president, Blockchain Development Platform (2019 & 2021)

Past employees

• Is among the slew of big names mentioned (12-6-2020) as previous experience on the CertiK team page.
• Ankr claims (11-11-2020) that some of its team members come from here (among other big companies).

Funding

• From this Cosmos blog (16-12-2020):

"Oracle Announces Fiscal 2021 Second Quarter Financial Results: Oracle Corporation (NYSE: ORCL) today announced fiscal 2021 Q2 results. Total quarterly revenues were up 2% year-over-year to $9.8 billion."

Partners 

• Is a partner with Quant according to this blog (1-6-2020).