Application Custom Development which cloud service to use?

Some time ago I wrote an article on customizations on eBS versus customizations in Fusion (http://pamkoertshuis.blogspot.nl/2015/10/ebs-integratie-versus-fusion-integratie.html).

I described we can use a PAAS platform to build our custom solutions, being custom forms (ADF), custom processing (PL/SQL packages) and custom processes (BPEL). Now let's assume we want to move our development towards the cloud. Which cloud offering would we need from Oracle?

So let's say these are the parts we need to build a custom application.

• Java Cloud Service
  We get a weblogic server, so we can develop our solutions in any development tool of our choice that can deploy our final solution to the weblogic server hosted on the JCS.
  So we could deploy our ADF and BPEL processing directly to JCS.
  JCS is supporting 11g and 12c. You can choose to start a JCS with 11g (PS6) or 12c (12.1.3).
• Java Cloud Service with SAAS Extension
  Java platform specially built to deploy extension for Oracle Software as a Service offerings, including Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Marketing Cloud.
  Dedicated environment running WebLogic Server.
  Three pre-configured sizes available: S1 (small one-node cluster), S2 (medium two-node cluster), and S4 (large four-node cluster).
  Fully managed by Oracle.
  Applications are managed through Oracle Cloud tooling; no customer access to the underlying infrastructure is required.
  You would use this if you only integrate to SAAS, where JCS is used for a full java based Enterprise project.
• SOA Cloud Service
  This allows as to develop SOA services directly in the cloud without the need of a local SOA suite. It doesn't provide a full fletched SOA solution, but it provides a lot of monitoring capabilities and easy to use setup screens.
  
  
• Database Cloud Service
  Well actually you ALWAYS will need this if you are developing anything with a database to store data.
• Integration Cloud Service
  ICS is a simple version of OSB (Oracle Service Bus) which allows you to interface data between cloud services. Adapters to external environments like Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, are out of the box. If you need more complex enrichment and translation, this solution does not provide you what you need.
  
  There is also a matter of cost ..currently  standard edition contains 2 connections (where each line is a connection).

Other things to consider is that for a full OTAP street you may need multiple subscriptions.

So in our case we would probably choose Java Cloud Service, build our solutions using JDeveloper and deploy them to the weblogic server on JCS. In that case you have three options as shown below.

 The full JCS offering seems the most logic one to use for full customizations.

Just another note on Developer Cloud Service, this service is for issue management, code management and to build and deploy onto Java Cloud Service. So it's not an environment with development TOOLS, but a service to help you during development process (version control, issue mgt, etc). The Developer Cloud Services comes free with Java Cloud Service.

It also includes the compute unit (Compute Cloud Service).