ISV News: How long have you been working in the technology industry, and how long with partners?
Erwin Schiffner: I've been working with partners in the technology industry for my whole career. After studying law at university, I joined BaaN to manage its reseller consulting programme, where I managed relationships with 40 resellers across the major Western European countries. I then took responsibility for sales and marketing in Eastern European territories during a period in which BaaN was restructuring to sell 100% through the channel - so I had overall responsibility for around 70 partners.

After BaaN I spent some time at Broadvision, setting up its Eastern European and Austrian operations, including its reseller channel.

I joined Oracle in 2003, where I was responsible first of all for the company's applications business in Austria, working with resellers and systems integrators. Since August this year I have been working on the ISV team in Oracle's EMEA Alliances and Channels division, as director of Oracle's embedded licence business for the region. In this role I'm responsible for devising and executing Oracle's embedded licencing strategy, and for recruiting ISV partners to work with us using this model.

ISVN: Can you explain how Oracle embedded licensing works?
ES: The Oracle Embedded Software Licence (ESL) has a highly advantageous pricing model for ISVs with an application that needs an embedded database or application server. It's based on a royalty-fee model, by which the ISV can either pay Oracle 5% or 10% of the list price of their own solution, or 20% of Oracle's own list price.

The embedded software licence is available to all Oracle PartnerNetwork members, with the only restrictions being that the database and/or application server must be truly embedded in the application, with no access from other applications. The partner sells and supports the Oracle database and/or middleware as an integral part of their own solution stack.

ISVN: What sort of solutions are suitable for the ESL?
ES: There are all kinds of applications that can benefit from an embedded Oracle licence, but currently we are looking at a lot of exciting opportunities in the areas of RFID, operating systems for mobile devices such as networking equipment and medical devices, and in-car automotive applications. We're very interested in working with any ISVs with solutions in these areas.

ISVN: How can interested ISVs find out more about Oracle's embedded software licence?
ES: Their first port of call should be their local in-county partner team. The best way to contact Oracle is to call the local Oracle PartnerNetwork Interaction Center. From there we can assess the vendor's solution, strategy and business model and arrange a meeting to discuss migration options and our migration services, as well as joint business plans and go-to-market initiatives.