E-Business Suite R12.2 Is now available!

The long-awaited update to E-Business Suite R12.2 is now available. I'm sure we'll hear more at OpenWorld this week, but until then:

The press release can be found here:

http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/press/2016931

Also, it is available for download on E-Delivery:

See me at Oracle OpenWorld

Oracle OpenWorld 2013 starts on Sunday, 22 September and runs through Thursday 26 September, 2013. This will be my first time presenting at an OpenWorld conference (I've presented numerous times at Collaborate and other OAUG-related events). I'm looking forward to meeting you!

E-Business Suite DBA Best Practices (CON4733)

Moscone West Room #3016

Thursday, 26 September 2:00PM - 3:00PM

And, while you're there, stop by the Atherio/RedRiver Solutions booth #122 in Moscone South. I'll be hanging out there from time to time as well! Enjoy the conference!

Oracle Support Changes for EBS (part deux)

On Monday, Cliff Godwin announced some significant changes to E-Business Suite support. The official announcement is now available on MOS (Note: 1495337.1). The text of the announcement is below:

As part of Oracle’s continued commitment to our customers, we will be providing an exception for the first 13 months of Sustaining Support on Oracle E-Business Suite Release 11.5.10 (11i10), valid from December 1, 2013 – December 31, 2014. This exception support will be comprised of three components: (1) new fixes for Severity 1 production issues, (2) United States Form 1099 2013 year-end updates, and (3) payroll regulatory updates for the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia for fiscal years ending in 2014.

In addition, the Extended Support period for E-Business Suite Release 12.1 has been extended through December, 2018. Customers with an active Oracle Premier Support for Software contract will automatically be entitled to Extended Support deliverables for E-Business Suite 12.1.

NOTE: The changes to 11i Sustaining Support do NOT extend to the security patches. Oracle will NOT provide Quarterly CPU patch for 11i will come out in October, 2013. The one exception to this is that they will provide fixes for "P1" security issues.

– James

E-Business Suite Current Release and Roadmap

Current release is R12.1.3 (but you already knew that!). Enhancements coming with R12.2 include Online Patching (20 years in the making) based on a database feature specifically requested by the E-Business Suite group called "Edition-Based Redefinition". The expectation is that you will be able to apply patches of any size with minimal downtime (less than an hour, target is more like 15 minutes).  (I will discuss this feature in a more in-depth posting later).

Other enhancements include integration with Endeca to provide an e-commerce shopping experience to many of your ERP business processes. (I've heard the "shopping for shoes" reference three times already at OpenWorld when discussing this feature). Cliff Godwin provided an interesting demo of this feature during his presentation earlier today. It is expected that this capability will be released "within the year". Cliff made a point to indicate that initial releases will cover several modules (I believe it was eight at initial release) but that new modules and Endeca-related features should come along quickly (due to the rapid development cycles available with Endeca). He was unclear, however, as to whether the Endeca feature set will be available on releases prior to R12.2.

– James

Oracle Support Changes Announced for EBS

During his session earlier today, Cliff Godwin announced some significant changes to the E-Business Suite support deadlines. I will put together a more polished post later, but for now, here are the details:

EBS 11i (11.5.10.2) is STILL on Sustaining Support until December 31, 2013. However, they are making a few exceptions to the Sustaining Support policy. First, they will continue to provide bugfixes for Severity 1 production problems until December 31, 2014. Secondly, they will continue to provide updates for US Form 1099 through 2013 Year End. And finally, they are committing to provide Fiscal Year End 2014 Payroll updates for US, Canada, and UK.

For customers on Release 12.1, Oracle is waiving the Extended Support fees until December of 2018.

-- James

MINOR CORRECTION: EBS 11i is not "still on sustaining support". EBS 11i is actually on Extended Support until Nov 2013. (Thanks, Srini, for pointing this out!)

Speculation about EBS Release 12.2

Floyd Teeter raises some good points in his blog posting out today. You can read the full posting here (http://orclville.blogspot.com/2012/08/i-wonder-what-tomorrow-has-in-mind-for.html). Primarily, that we won't actually have EBS R12.2 released during OpenWorld (as many of us were hoping).

Don't get me wrong, there will certainly be some good EBS R12.2 information out there. Oracle put together a very informative presentation and discussion surrounding the patching changes at Collaborate in Las Vegas this past spring. You can almost certainly bet that there will be an updated version at OpenWorld.

But, considering that the closed Beta program is still underway and the Early Adopter program hasn't started, any path of deduction should tell you that you're not going to have a R12.2 "GA" announcement for a few months at best. Which most means that sometime around Collaborate 2013 (Denver) would be a decent guess.

– James