Oracle Wins Cloud Contract from Dish’s 5G Network Project

Oracle (ORCL) has secured a cloud computing contract with Dish Wireless, the unit of DISH Network (DISH) focused on mobile services. Oracle sells business software and competes for cloud market share with Amazon (AMZN), Microsoft (MSFT), and Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google.

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Dish is building a cloud-based 5G network as it works to expand its wireless business and diversify outside its legacy satellite pay-TV market. It has selected Oracle Cloud to provide the service-based architecture for the 5G network.

“Oracle’s capabilities will essentially serve as the control tower of our network core, enabling our customers to consume software on demand,” said Marc Rouanne, chief network officer at Dish Wireless.

The financial terms of the deal were not revealed, but it gives Oracle an important role in Dish’s 5G network build-out project.

In addition to the Dish Wireless contract, Oracle also announced teaming up with Oxford University in an arrangement that involves using its cloud resources to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The goal is to speed up genetic analysis of the coronavirus to help identify variants quickly. The outbreak of new COVID-19 strains is frustrating the efforts to bring the pandemic to an end. (See Oracle stock analysis on TipRanks)

On April 23, Wolfe Research analyst Alex Zukin initiated coverage on Oracle stock with a Hold rating and a $75 price target. Zukin’s price target points to 4.93% downside potential. The analyst observed that Oracle’s business has not been growing well lately and needs to improve for the stock to rise.

“We ultimately believe ORCL needs to show mid-single digit growth for shares to meaningfully re-rate and outperform other software stocks over a multi-year horizon,” noted Zukin.

Consensus among analysts on Wall Street is a Moderate Buy based on 8 Buy and 14 Hold ratings. The average analyst price target of $74.42 implies 5.67% downside potential to current levels.

ORCL scores an 8 out of 10 on TipRanks’ Smart Score rating system, indicating the stock is likely to outperform the market.