Oracle buys SUN reduces competition in the database market by removing the threat of MySQL
Oracle Corp.’s US$7.4 billion acquisition of Sun Microsystems Inc. will bring together the world’s most valuable relational database with the most popular open source one — MySQL.
Oracle reaped $8.34 billion from database sales in 2007, giving it 37.6% of the $22.2 billion global market, according to IDC. The 2008 figures are not yet available, IDC said.
MySQL’s sales, meanwhile, were just $38 million in 2007, ranking it just 19th in the market, according to IDC. The open source database placed behind a plethora of unheralded database vendors, such as Siemens, Unisys, Hitachi, even Apple Inc., whose Filemaker personal database had triple MySQL’s revenue.
Also, Oracle has said early on that Sun will continue to operate as a separate entity. That means MySQL will likely at least maintain it independence, as well as staying far enough away from Oracle’s pricey database to prevent inadvertent cannibalization, he said.
Alfresco’s Newton agreed, though he argued that Oracle may try to subtly steer the course of MySQL’s development to slow the addition of features such as more scalable clustering that would compete with Oracle’s main database.
But even if that happens, the open-source community as well as makers of third-party MySQL storage engines could ensure that such options remain available, he said.
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