Navigating recent Oracle Java pricing and licensing changes

Businesses today run on Java. Nearly 30 years after its introduction, Java remains the programming language of choice for large-scale enterprise applications in the cloud, on-prem or hybrid thanks to its unmatched versatility, reliability, stability and the vast amount of available open-source and third-party libraries and frameworks that make developing Java applications highly efficient.

A recent report and survey found that 98% of businesses use Java in their software applications or infrastructure, and 57% of those organizations indicate that Java is the backbone of most of their applications. Compound this number by Java-based frameworks, libraries and JVM-based languages and it’s clear Java plays an instrumental role in the modern enterprise.

Lately, however, a series of licensing and pricing changes for Oracle Java SE, the popular Java runtime and support subscription, has raised concerns across the global Java community. Under the latest terms, businesses will now be charged based on the number of employees in the company, including contractors and other third parties who support the business operations, rather than how much Java is used. The difference is substantial—most organizations will pay two to five times as much under the new model. More than 8 out of 10 companies currently using Oracle Java said they are concerned about the new pricing. After the fourth major licensing or pricing change in four years, many companies are considering moving to alternative distributions of Java, such as those based on OpenJDK. One of the world’s top research universities made the switch and reported substantial cost savings and greater ease of doing business.

Read the rest of the article for free here: https://easysam.co.uk/knowledge-base/navigating-recent-oracle-java-pricing-and-licensing-changes/