Microsoft and Oracle are working together? Oh, wait. I guess that should be a statement instead of a question. The two companies have joined forces in a new cloud venture. It seems Larry Ellison has embraced the wisdom of that ancient Arabic proverb “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

The nuts and bolts of the deal are that Microsoft and Oracle are teaming up to deliver Oracle software via Microsoft’s cloud platform, Azure. Azure customers will be able to run Java, Oracle Database, Oracle WebLogic Server, and even Oracle Linux on Windows Server Hyper-V or Windows Azure, and Oracle will deliver full certification and support.

It’s a dramatic reversal for Oracle, to put it mildly. Oracle founder and CEO Larry Ellison has been on a one-man quest to crush Microsoft for years. It’s always seemed a bit Quixotic, though, because Oracle isn’t in the same league and has never come close to achieving Ellison’s goal.

So, why this partnership? Why now? In a nutshell, it just makes sense for both parties. It’s a win-win move that benefits Microsoft and Oracle; one positions both companies to compete more aggressively with their respective rivals.

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