Oracle and Red Bull Racing Partner to Advance F1 Analytics

The News: Red Bull Racing, the four-time Formula 1 World Champion team, has chosen Oracle as its official cloud infrastructure partner.

Red Bull will leverage the machine learning and data analytics capabilities of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) to optimize the way data is used across its business; from on-track activities to putting more information in the hands of the Team’s global fan base. The OCI-powered capabilities will help the team sharpen its already formidable competitive edge. Read the full release in Oracle’s Newsroom.

Analyst Take: We have seen an aggressive investment by professional sporting organizations to apply technology, especially analytics, to drive improved performance. This new announcement from Red Bull Racing Honda speaks to how Formula One racing teams seek to apply analytics to materially improve performance in search of performance optimization across every aspect of the racing lifecycle. 

While the announcement itself serves as a validation point for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), which has seen a solid run of growth over the past several quarters, the decision was made based upon a set of criteria from Red Bull Racing Honda. The team set out for a technology partner that could manage the converging requirements for performance, scale, and security to enable the utilization of advanced data science and analytics. The selection of Oracle indeed represents a significant win for Oracle, as several technology players have the offering mix to have supported Red Bull’s needs. 

Off the track, the Red Bull Racing Honda partnership with Oracle is also deepening, which makes sense given Red Bull’s aggressive approach to customer engagement. This extends from the company’s well-known use of “brand studio” to build fan engagement and extends into the specific sporting teams, including racing. I believe this drives the team’s decision to leverage Oracle’s broad portfolio of Customer Experience (CX) applications, including Oracle Unity Customer Data Platform, Oracle CrowdTwist Loyalty and Engagement, and Oracle Responsys Campaign Management. With these tools, the Red Bull Racing Honda team can provide fans greater access to statistics and metrics to drive deeper engagement. This has been even more important throughout the pandemic where sporting events haven’t had the historically important live element.  

Ultimately, I believe wins like this have dual value for Oracle. Right now, the company is diligently working to position itself as a more prominent player in the cloud. From business applications to Exadata, the company sees growth in the cloud but has still had to fight to earn cloud props due to its legacy in database and prem. While it is only one customer win, it is a notable one in a space with significant applications for real-time analytics and the advanced use of AI/ML and Cloud Capabilities–with the broad deployment of CX tools as a further indication of Oracle’s broadening solutions and competitiveness. 

Futurum Research provides industry research and analysis. These columns are for educational purposes only and should not be considered in any way investment advice.

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Image: Oracle

The original version of this article was first published on Futurum Research.