In a session this afternoon titled “Three trends in the Oracle world,” Rich Niemiec, funnyman and CEO of Oracle consulting firm TUSC, outlined what he saw as three major trends in general product direction for Oracle. For those of you who missed the session or couldn’t make it to Collaborate ’07 this year, here’s where Rich sees Oracle (and companies that use Oracle) going in the future:

• Grid computing and consolidation: Niemiec reminded us that RAC is embedded in the word “Oracle.” Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) technology is being adopted widely because it’s scalable and highly available.
  
• A shift toward Linux: Linux is Oracle’s fastest-growing platform. Why does Linux help RAC/grid? Because “Larry says so,” according to Niemiec. Larry Ellison sets trends and other companies follow.
  
• A shift to a mixed-resource model: Niemiec claimed that the trend in the ‘90s toward offshoring is lessening, and enterprises will begin to move to an IT structure that combines in-house departments, outsourcing and offshoring depending on size and other factors.
  

-Elisa