Volume V · Number II
Spring MMXXVI Edition
Founded 2020 · Buyer Side Quarterly
Oracle Software Licensing.
New York · London · Stockholm
Independent of Oracle Corporation
Cover · The Founding

A boutique advisory, founded in 2020, running the forensic assessments Oracle runs on its customers.

The premise of the firm is unfussy. Oracle is a sophisticated commercial organisation that has spent forty years refining the machinery by which licence positions become revenue. The buyer side rarely has the same machinery in return. This firm exists to close that gap. We know how findings are built, what stands up in negotiation, and which clauses Oracle actively negotiates, because buyer side Oracle advisory is the entire focus of the practice. Across more than 750 engagements, we have applied that knowledge for the buyer, never the vendor.

Feature One The firm.

Why an Oracle specialist firm. And why now.

Oracle's commercial machinery is sophisticated, calibrated, and persistent. It is not malicious. It is simply working, every quarter, every renewal cycle, every audit window, to convert installed estate into recurring revenue. The buyer side rarely has the same machinery in return, and so the buyer side rarely wins.

The firm was founded in 2020 as a dedicated buyer side practice. The bench pairs deep Oracle licensing specialists with senior procurement and vendor management professionals recruited from in-house roles at Fortune 500 and FTSE 350 enterprises. The shape of the firm is deliberate. Independent specialists at every level, buyer side experts on the bench, a single line of accountability into every engagement.

We know how findings are built because we have taken hundreds of them apart. We know which clauses Oracle negotiates and which it never does, because we sit across the table from it every quarter.

We do not resell Oracle software. We do not implement it. We perform independent forensic assessments of Oracle estates, then negotiate the result. Every engagement begins with a clean measurement of the actual licence position against the contractual ruleset, performed earlier than Oracle would, with cleaner data, and against the contract that exists rather than the contract that Oracle wishes existed.

The method is documented and repeatable. Phase one contains the conversation. Phase two measures the estate. Phase three negotiates the result. Phase four converts the settlement into forward commercial value rather than backward payment. More than seven hundred and fifty engagements, an average audit reduction of seventy percent, and over three hundred million dollars in client savings, all delivered by the same process applied with the same discipline.

The practice is global. New York, London, and Stockholm. Every engagement is led by a partner. We do not subcontract.

Feature Two The method.

Four phases, applied in order, since 2020.

i.

Contain

The first response shapes the engagement. We open the channel with Oracle, define the scope of the conversation, lock the calendar, and ensure no data leaves the perimeter without buyer side review.

2 to 4 weeks
ii.

Measure

An independent measurement against the same ruleset Oracle will apply, performed earlier, with cleaner data, and against the contractual definitions rather than assumed positions. Findings categorised by exposure tier.

6 to 12 weeks
iii.

Negotiate

Findings documented and argued line by line. Concessions priced. The settlement is converted into forward commercial value rather than backward payment. We have sat on the other side of these tables.

8 to 20 weeks
iv.

Convert

Every engagement closes with a stronger contract than it opened with. Renewal protections, audit cure provisions, and portability written into the result so the next conversation begins from a better position.

4 to 8 weeks
Feature Three The practice.

Eight disciplines. The complete Oracle product surface.

Feature Four The reports.

Three recent files, anonymised throughout.

Report 01 / 2026
2026
Manufacturing
Oracle Database EE + Options

A core factor review unwound a $24M Database option pack claim across forty seven instances.

A Tier 1 industrial received an LMS finding tied to undeclared Partitioning, Advanced Compression, and Diagnostics Pack usage. Oracle's measurement script captured everything that had ever been touched, including options enabled by previous administrators and never used in production.

The engagement turned on a precise audit of who had actually enabled what, when, and under whose authority. Three quarters of the claim dissolved on documentary grounds. The remainder was converted into forward commercial value through a renegotiated support contract with restructured option pack entitlements.

Initial claim
$24.0M
Final settlement
$5.8M
Reduction
76%
Report 02 / 2025
2025
Financial Services
Java SE Universal Subscription

A Java SE employee metric negotiation cut a $9M proposal to $1.4M.

A European retail bank with nineteen thousand employees had eleven hundred actual Java users. The Universal Subscription pricing assumed total headcount, a methodology that produced a proposal disconnected from operational reality.

We modelled the alternative, structured the carve out, and negotiated a contract that priced reality rather than the org chart. The final agreement included a defined active user methodology, annual reconciliation, and a portability clause permitting migration to alternative JDK distributions without penalty.

Initial proposal
$9.0M
Final settlement
$1.4M
Reduction
84%
Report 03 / 2025
2025
Retail
Oracle ULA Certification

A ULA certification declared 7,242 processors across forty entities with zero disputes.

A multi entity retailer reached the end of a three year ULA with significant deployment growth across acquired subsidiaries. The deployment count had been contested before our involvement, with Oracle's preliminary assessment running well below the actual figure.

The certification preparation took fourteen weeks and produced documentary evidence Oracle ultimately accepted without challenge. The resulting perpetual entitlement was valued at approximately $48M and now serves as the baseline for the client's ongoing Oracle estate management.

Processors certified
7,242
Estimated value
$48M
Disputes
0
Feature Five The library.

From the working notes of partners.

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