IBM Quietly Endorses Open Source Database
Sun Microsystems’ MySQL is the database to beat in the open source market. But another option — EnterpriseDB — has caught the attention of several investors — including IBM. Here’s the scoop for potential partners.
EnterpriseDB is well-known in open source circles. But most solutions providers — particularly Microsoft SQL Server partners — may not know the EnterprisDB name just yet.
That could change as EnterpriseDB continues to attract funding and attention from some major companies. The company just scored $10 million in Series C venture funding, and IBM is among the companies pumping money into EnterpriseDB.
Surely, Sun betting $1 billion on its MySQL acquisition is a far bigger bet than IBM writing a far smaller check out to EnterpriseDB.
But consider the following scenario: In most software markets, IBM wants to avoid a Windows-type scenario where one company winds up controlling 90 percent of an industry.
In the Linux market, for instance, IBM has openly backed Novell SuSE Linux and Red Hat Linux as a way to force balance and healthy competition. And there are rumblings that IBM will increase its support of Ubuntu Linux in the next few months.
Now, we’re seeing a similar scenario in the open source database market, where MySQL generates most of the ink in the mainstream press.
In April 2007, IBM announced plans to more aggressively back MySQL. But Big Blue’s commitment to stir competition remains intact.
By pumping a few dollars into EnterpriseDB, IBM is essentially telling customers that it’s safe to select EnterpriseDB on IBM’s hardware, and it’s safe to integrate EnterpriseDB with IBM’s own middleware products.
Ensuring customer choice, it seems, is one of the secrets to IBM’s ongoing hardware and middleware success.
Sun used to be a pretty big EnterpriseDB proponent but that seems to have changed since the MySQL purchase
[…] IBM Quietly Endorses Open Source Database Filed under: rss #8212; bob@lxer.com @ 2:46 am MySQL is the open source database to beat. But another option ? EnterpriseDB ? has caught the attention of several investors ? including IBM. Here?s the scoop for potential partners. […]
[…] another option ? EnterpriseDB ? has caught the attention of several investors ? including IBM. Here?s the scoop for potential partners. MySQL is the open source database to beat. But another option ? EnterpriseDB ? has caught the […]
[…] another option ? EnterpriseDB ? has caught the attention of several investors ? including IBM. Here?s the scoop for potential partners. March 25, 2008 middot; Linux, News, Open Source […]
EntepriseDB is NOT open source in any shape or form. It is a proprietary variant of PostgreSQL. Verify your information before publishing nonsense.
Response to #5/Jef: For those readers who aren’t sure whether EnterpriseDB is open or closed source, you can find some background on that debate here.
The debate you are pointing is the one about whether EnterpriseDB is a open source company or not. Really, look at the license of EnterpriseDB and see if it qualifies for being recognized as either Free software or open source software. There are very simple rule associated with either
http://fsf.org
http://www.opensource.org/docs/osd
Come back and clarify your stand point.
Jef: The VAR Guy has to concede … he’s not an expert on open source licenses. So he can’t debate you … but he welcomes healthy debate from other readers. Would it would be wiser for The VAR Guy to have written that EnterpriseDB is “based” on open source? Thoughts?