Oracle signs data mining deals

Oracle (Redwood Shores, CA) has signed agreements with seven data mining companies as part of its Warehouse Initiative program. The participating companies are Angoss

(Toronto), DataMind (San Mateo, CA), Datasage (Reading, MA), Information Discovery (Hermosa Beach, CA), SPSS (Chicago), SRA International (Arlington, VA) and Thinking Machines (Burlington, MA). Their data mining offerings, when combined with Oracle's data warehouses and Oracle 8 data server, will be targeted at the finance, government, healthcare, retail and telecommunications industries. The data mining initiative highlights the various benefits that different data mining products can offer, according to Giga Information Group (Norwell, MA) research director Teresa Wingfield. "There isn't one data mining product that address all business needs," she said. Instead of applying a single data mining technology to disparate business challenges, "Oracle has selected a partnership approach that includes vendors that have demonstrated success in a wide array of areas." The companies were selected on criteria based on product success and innovation, integration with Oracle products, and industry specialization.