Over the past years, Oracle has been working in the OpenJDK Community and the JCP to enable Java SE in general, and Oracle JDK in particular, to scale down to smaller devices.

A first step was to introduce Compact Profiles to Java SE 8. This feature is available in Oracle Java SE 8 Embedded.  The next step was to introduce a module system to Java SE 9 through project Jigsaw.  Using the new jlink tool, a set of user-supplied modules and their runtime dependencies can be assembled and optimized into a custom run-time image, containing just the JDK 9 modules required by the application to run. This feature offers even more fine-grained control over an application's runtime footprint than Compact Profiles. Interested developers can try this and many other JDK 9 features and contribute to their development through the OpenJDK Community.

JDK 9 also introduces a new experimental static “Ahead of Time – AOT” (JEP 295) enhancement to the Java platform. This new compilation tool will facilitate (over time) the creation of compact and statically linked images that will demand much less dynamic JVM infrastructure.  AOT will enable significant reduction of runtime footprint requirements for Java applications as well as drastically improving startup performance. Oracle has contributed this new AOT compiler to the OpenJDK Community.

In the past year Oracle has also contributed a unified port of HotSpot for 32-bit and 64-bit ARM platforms for JDK 9 to the OpenJDK Community.  This contribution was done through and with the assistance of the existing 32-bit AArch32 Port Project in OpenJDK, which complements the OpenJDK 64-bit AArch64 Port Project.

Last but not least, Oracle created the OpenJDK Mobile Project to focus on porting the JDK to popular mobile platforms such as iOS, Android, and Windows.

Having opened up the relevant Oracle Java SE Embedded ports, the open source Java SE Embedded community can now continue to innovate and collaborate on JDK 9 as part of a vibrant open source community.

Accordingly, starting with JDK 9, Oracle doesn't plan to offer a separate "Oracle Java SE Embedded" download.  In other words, Oracle Java SE 8 Embedded is the final release series of the "Oracle Java SE Embedded" product.  New features in JDK 9 obviate the need for it to be a separate product.