For years, “multi-cloud” often meant siloed cloud — some workloads in OCI, others in Azure, stitched together with fragile integrations, added latency, and plenty of operational pain.
With the rollout of Oracle Database@Azure, those walls are finally coming down.
Oracle databases now run directly inside Azure data centers, with native networking, identity, and billing integration. And quietly — but critically — one of the most powerful additions to this ecosystem is the managed Oracle GoldenGate service, now available natively alongside Oracle Database@Azure.
Naturally, this raises a question:
“If I already have Microsoft Fabric for analytics, why do I need GoldenGate? Aren’t they competing?”
The short answer is no.
The longer — and more interesting — answer is that GoldenGate and Fabric together form one of the strongest enterprise data architectures available today.
The End of “Siloed” Multi-Cloud
Before Oracle Database@Azure, replicating Oracle data into Azure typically meant one of two things:
- Hairpinning traffic through interconnects
- Managing your own GoldenGate infrastructure on IaaS
Both approaches worked, but neither was elegant — and latency was always part of the story.
With the managed GoldenGate service running physically inside Azure data centers, right next to Oracle Exadata, that changes completely.
The Latency Game Changer
GoldenGate now operates co-located with Oracle Database@Azure, allowing:
- Sub-millisecond latency
- No public internet traversal
- No cross-cloud data gravity issues
Changes are captured and applied without ever leaving Azure’s network backbone. For the first time, Oracle-to-Azure replication feels native — not bolted on.
GoldenGate vs. Fabric: The Ingestion Misconception
It’s easy to see why GoldenGate and Fabric get compared.
Both move data. Both talk about real-time.
But they solve very different problems.
- Microsoft Fabric is an analytics and data platform
Its job is to unify storage (OneLake), compute, governance, BI, and AI. It is where insights are created. - Oracle GoldenGate is a data replication engine
Its job is transactional fidelity, zero-downtime movement, and deep understanding of database internals.
Fabric’s native mirroring and ingestion tools are excellent for general-purpose scenarios. But when you’re dealing with mission-critical Oracle workloads — complex schemas, high redo volume, strict consistency requirements — a specialized replication engine matters.
GoldenGate reads Oracle redo logs natively. That’s not just faster — it’s fundamentally more precise.
A “Better Together” Architecture
Here’s how these services naturally coexist in a modern Oracle Database@Azure architecture:
- The Source
Mission-critical systems — ERP, core banking, supply chain — run on Oracle Exadata within Oracle Database@Azure. - The Pipe (GoldenGate)
Managed GoldenGate captures changes in real time with full transactional fidelity.
It can filter, transform, and even mask sensitive data before it leaves the operational layer. - The Destination (Fabric)
GoldenGate streams data directly into OneLake or Azure Data Lake Storage, where Microsoft Fabric takes over. - The Insight
Fabric handles transformations, Spark workloads, semantic models, Power BI dashboards, and AI experiences.
GoldenGate ensures the data is timely and accurate.
Fabric ensures the data is usable and valuable.
Why Not Just Use Fabric Mirroring?
For simpler use cases, Fabric’s native mirroring is absolutely sufficient.
But many enterprise Oracle environments demand more:
- Bi-directional replication (active-active patterns)
- Conflict detection and resolution
- Fine-grained filtering and transformations
- The ability to replicate out of Azure when needed
GoldenGate has decades of production pedigree in exactly these scenarios. That maturity still matters.
The Strategic Value
Beyond architecture, there’s a broader strategic upside:
- Unified Billing
Managed GoldenGate consumption counts toward your Microsoft Azure Consumption Commitment (MACC). - Best of Breed
DBAs get the industry standard for Oracle replication.
Data engineers and analysts get Microsoft Fabric. - Future-Proof Multicloud
Data can move freely — without locking analytics or operations into a single platform.
Final Thoughts
Oracle Database@Azure is more than a hosting option — it’s a bridge between two ecosystems.
In that bridge:
- GoldenGate is the high-fidelity data movement layer
- Fabric is the analytics and intelligence layer
They are not competitors. They are complementary — and together, they finally make integrated multi-cloud real.
For organizations running critical Oracle workloads on Azure, this isn’t an either/or decision. It’s the blueprint for a modern data estate.