Oracle Increases Prices for Java - Look to BigFix for a Solution

On January 23, 2023, Oracle announced a new licensing model for Oracle Java that represents a dramatic price increase for large organizations. For example, a 40,000-employee organization will spend USD$2.5M annually on Oracle Java alone.

Previously Oracle Java customers had based their licensing on a less costly combination of client devices and processors for servers, but the new licensing is based on the employee count of an organization with a broad definition of employee that includes full-time, part-time, temporary employees and agents, contractors, outsources, and consultants that support internal business operations. This, combined with Oracle’s existing License Management Service has raised concerns with customers who may have over deployed Oracle Java and face audit risk.

The BigFix Inventory team has extensive technology for discovering Oracle Java. The development worked directly with Oracle engineers to correctly identify Oracle Java and its licensable components. This work is in line with an Oracle Java licensing standard certification program that multiple vendors use today.

To help our customers navigate this Oracle change, BigFix Inventory can identify which machines have Oracle Java to avoid unexpected license compliance issues. Using this information provided by BigFix, you can quickly identify which organizations and services utilizing Oracle Java and determine if it is necessary and required to avoid license exposure.

After this initial work to resolve potential licensing issues with Oracle Java, you can utilize BigFix Inventory to automatically notify you about any new discovery of Oracle Java to avoid unexpected issues from happening.

For additional information on this announcement you can read: Oracle Java Licensing Switches

Contact us to learn more about HCL BigFix and software asset management, or visit our Customer References page.