The news
NetApp (NTAP) and Oracle (ORCL) said on September 29 they plan a fully managed NetApp storage service inside Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI). The NetApp Oracle cloud storage service aims to help enterprises move AI and business workloads to Oracle's cloud without redesigning storage.
Called OCI NetApp Storage Service, the offering brings ONTAP, NetApp's data management software and storage operating system, into OCI as a native service. The companies said it is built for databases, enterprise applications, virtualized environments, chip design and high-performance computing, regulated applications and AI data pipelines.
Customers will be able to run the service from the OCI Console and software development kits, through ONTAP's own application programming interfaces (APIs), and with the operational workflows they already use, according to the announcement. The pitch is aimed at businesses that already run ONTAP in their own data centers: they could move those workloads to OCI with minimal application redesign and few changes to how storage is managed.
The service is planned for general availability within the next 12 months, the companies said. Stocktwits reported that it is in preview. Neither company disclosed pricing or launch regions, and both attached disclaimers saying the plans could change. NetApp's statement said its comments on unreleased offerings should not be relied upon for purchasing or other decisions.
Konstantinos (kp) Papamiltiadis, senior vice president of partnerships at OCI, said enterprises "shouldn't have to rebuild their data infrastructure to move to the cloud." Pravjit Tiwana, NetApp's senior vice president and general manager for cloud storage and services, said customers want to move AI and enterprise workloads without giving up simplicity, data management and reliability. Alvaro Celis, NetApp's chief commercial, partner and ecosystem officer, pointed to regulated industries as a focus.
The numbers
- Planned general availability
- Within the next 12 months (announced September 29)
- Rival clouds already selling NetApp-based storage
- AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud
- Pricing
- Not disclosed
Why CEOs should care
For CIOs with large NetApp estates, the service could remove a common friction in moving to OCI: re-engineering storage and retraining storage teams. It also adds negotiating leverage. AWS sells Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP, Microsoft sells Azure NetApp Files and Google offers Google Cloud NetApp Volumes, so once Oracle's service is generally available, ONTAP shops will be able to compare four providers for NetApp-based cloud storage. Ask for preview access and benchmark your own workloads before committing.
CFOs should treat this as a roadmap item, not a budget line. There is no price, no firm launch date beyond a 12-month window, and both companies say plans may change. If a migration business case depends on the service, build in a fallback and tie any new OCI spending commitments to the service actually reaching general availability.
For regulated industries, which NetApp singled out, the question is whether data protection, replication and governance behave the same in OCI as they do on premises. Ask which ONTAP features will be included at launch, which OCI regions will offer the service, how replication between on-premises systems and OCI will be priced, and who handles support when something fails: Oracle, NetApp or both.
The bigger picture
Oracle is pushing hard to win AI and enterprise workloads for OCI. TipRanks reported that Oracle is racing to generate at least $90 billion in revenue in fiscal 2027, that its first fiscal quarter revenue hit $19.3 billion, up 30% from a year earlier, and that it has taken on large amounts of debt to fund its AI buildout. Partnerships that lower the cost of moving enterprise data are one way to fill that capacity with paying customers.
For NetApp, the deal extends a strategy of embedding ONTAP inside the major clouds. NetApp describes its platform as the only enterprise storage platform natively embedded in the world's largest clouds. Adding OCI widens that footprint to a provider that is courting AI workloads, and gives NetApp customers another destination that does not require abandoning their existing storage tools.
What’s next
Watch for named preview customers, launch regions and pricing, and whether general availability arrives inside the 12-month window. Also watch whether Oracle pairs the service with migration incentives, which would signal how aggressively it plans to use NetApp to pull on-premises data onto OCI.
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