Integrating OCI with External Cloud Providers (AWS, Azure)

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As more enterprises adopt multi-cloud strategies, seamless integration between cloud providers like Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Microsoft Azure becomes essential. This integration unlocks operational flexibility, optimized workloads, high availability, and cost efficiency.

In this blog, we’ll explore how OCI integrates with external cloud providers, specifically focusing on FastConnect, data transfer, and hybrid cloud setups. These use cases are critical for enterprise-grade deployments where interoperability and high-performance connectivity are paramount.


🌐 Why Multi-Cloud?

Before diving into the technical details, let’s understand the why:

  • Avoid vendor lock-in

  • Leverage best-of-breed services from each cloud (e.g., Oracle Autonomous Database on OCI, AI/ML on AWS)

  • Disaster recovery and compliance across multiple jurisdictions

  • Geographical redundancy and performance optimization

🔗 FastConnect with AWS and Azure

🧭 What is FastConnect?

Oracle FastConnect provides a dedicated, private, high-throughput, and low-latency connection between your on-premises or external cloud environment and OCI. It's Oracle’s equivalent of AWS Direct Connect and Azure ExpressRoute.

📦 Use Case 1: High-Speed Connectivity with AWS

Oracle and AWS offer a multi-cloud interconnect that allows customers to establish a dedicated private connection between OCI and AWS via FastConnect and AWS Direct Connect.

🔧 Architecture Overview

  • Oracle FastConnect connects to an AWS Direct Connect location (e.g., Equinix).

  • Traffic flows securely over a private backbone.

  • Enables low-latency communication between OCI services (like Autonomous Database) and AWS services (like EC2, Lambda).

✅ Benefits

  • Up to 10 Gbps throughput

  • Sub-2ms latency in many regions

  • Simplified multi-cloud architecture

  • No need to go over the public internet

🌍 Supported Regions

  • US East (Ashburn)

  • US West (San Jose)

  • London

  • Frankfurt

  • Tokyo

Tip: Use Route53 in AWS and OCI’s DNS service together to resolve inter-cloud services smoothly.

📦 Use Case 2: Interconnecting OCI with Azure

Oracle and Microsoft have partnered to create the OCI-Azure Interconnect.

🔧 Architecture Overview

  • Azure ExpressRoute is linked to Oracle FastConnect.

  • Direct peering between OCI and Azure in strategic regions.

  • Services like Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) can access Oracle Autonomous Database securely and quickly.

✅ Benefits

  • Unified identity and single sign-on (SSO)

  • Multi-cloud resource provisioning using Terraform or Azure Resource Manager

  • Direct, low-latency access to Oracle databases from Azure compute

🌍 Supported Regions

  • US East (Ashburn – Azure US East)

  • UK South (London – Azure UK South)

  • Netherlands (Amsterdam – Azure West Europe)

  • Japan East (Tokyo – Azure Japan East)

Pro Tip: You can automate multi-cloud deployments using Terraform modules supported by both Oracle and Azure. 

🚛 Secure and Efficient Data Transfer Between Clouds

Moving large amounts of data between cloud providers is a challenge due to cost, latency, and security concerns. Here are some proven options:

🔁 Use Case 3: Large-Scale Data Transfer

Option 1: Object Storage Cross-Cloud Sync

  • Export data from AWS S3 or Azure Blob Storage.

  • Import into OCI Object Storage using tools like:

    • rclone

    • Oracle Cloud Infrastructure CLI

    • Oracle Data Transfer Appliance (for petabyte-scale migrations)

Option 2: Data Integration Tools

  • Use Oracle Data Integration or GoldenGate for real-time data replication.

  • Replicate between Oracle DB on OCI and PostgreSQL on AWS or SQL Server on Azure.

Option 3: Cloud-Native Transfer

  • Use AWS DataSync or Azure Data Factory with custom connectors.

  • Use the OCI External Bucket feature to connect to AWS S3 directly from OCI.

🏗️ Use Case 4: Hybrid Cloud Setups



Many organizations operate in a hybrid cloud mode, combining on-premises infrastructure, OCI, and other cloud providers.

🔧 Hybrid Architecture Patterns

  • Bursting to Cloud: On-prem workloads burst to AWS or OCI during peak hours.

  • Data Gravity: Keep large databases in OCI, compute in Azure/AWS.

  • Failover & DR: Use OCI as a disaster recovery site for AWS-hosted services, or vice versa.

  • Compliance Zones: Run regulated workloads in Oracle Cloud and use AWS for analytics and innovation.

🛠️ Key Tools & Services

PurposeOCI ToolAWS / Azure Equivalent
NetworkingFastConnectDirect Connect / ExpressRoute
Identity FederationIAM Federation (AD, Azure AD)IAM, Azure AD B2B
AutomationResource Manager (Terraform)CloudFormation / ARM
MonitoringOCI Logging, MonitoringCloudWatch / Azure Monitor
Database ReplicationOracle GoldenGate, Data PumpDMS / SQL Data Sync

🔐 Security Considerations

  • Use private endpoints wherever possible.

  • Enable encryption at rest and in transit across all clouds.

  • Implement IAM federation and single sign-on.

  • Log and audit all traffic using OCI Logging and AWS CloudTrail/Azure Monitor.

🚀 Real-World Example

A global financial firm:

  • Runs core banking apps in OCI using Autonomous Transaction Processing.

  • Uses AWS Lambda to process customer transactions.

  • Uses FastConnect + Direct Connect to establish 1Gbps dedicated connectivity between OCI (Ashburn) and AWS (US-East).

  • Data is replicated in near real-time using Oracle GoldenGate between OCI and RDS PostgreSQL on AWS.

📌 Conclusion

Integrating OCI with AWS and Azure is no longer a complex, risky endeavor. With Oracle’s FastConnect partnerships, data movement tools, and hybrid-ready architecture, enterprises can build robust multi-cloud and hybrid-cloud setups that unlock the best features of each platform.

Whether you're seeking low-latency private connectivity, secure data replication, or a hybrid DR strategy, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure has the building blocks to integrate with external clouds seamlessly.

🧠 Learn More

Author: Vidhyadharan Thirumurugan
Published on: 26/06/2025
Tags: Oracle Cloud, OCI CLI, Automation, DevOps, Cloud Shell, oci shell

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