Oracle (Corporation) buys Sun (Microsystems) in $7.4B deal

[Q Classic]

-Sun's open-sourced all but <5% of Java, and the IcedTea (OpenJDK) is fully compatible. Java will survive for the time being, regardless of what Oracle does.

-MySQL's already been forked once, with Drizzle(?), though I don't know how well that's taken off. As far as its "niche" usage, I don't know about that... a lot of places use it. Wikipedia, Google does some stuff, Amazon some.

But, discussion at the workplace as to what'll happen?
It's only going to support the SQL standard erratically.
Also, transactions will limited to the rarest table type.

[Q Classic]

http://openjdk.java.net/

[Asher]

-Sun's open-sourced all but <5% of Java, and the IcedTea (OpenJDK) is fully compatible. Java will survive for the time being, regardless of what Oracle does.

-MySQL's already been forked once, with Drizzle(?), though I don't know how well that's taken off. As far as its "niche" usage, I don't know about that... a lot of places use it. Wikipedia, Google does some stuff, Amazon some.

Those are ALL niches. Guaranteed Sun isn't making any revenue off those guys to begin with. Those companies don't need MySQL support. The vast majority of companies aren't in those guys of models.

[DanS]

I think MySQL is like a lot of open source applications. It's used a lot but nobody makes much money off of it.

[Q Classic]

I think we're using "niche" in very different senses. DanS is more right in that it's the go-to DB for a lot of Web2.0/OSS webapps, used by so many who then don't bother to sign up for a contract with Oracle neé Sun neé MySQL AB.

So, in terms of usage, not really "niche", since it's quite mainstream.

But it terms of the clients they could possibly have, yeah, I suppose it's pretty limited, since the small shops don't need corporate support, and the big ones can deal with the issues on their own.

[ZEE]

unless we define the word "niche" this thread will go nowhere, IMO.

[Q Classic]

Some thoughts:

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2009/04/oracle-acquires-sun-ars-explores-the-impact-on-open-source.ars

[Asher]

I think we're using "niche" in very different senses. DanS is more right in that it's the go-to DB for a lot of Web2.0/OSS webapps, used by so many who then don't bother to sign up for a contract with Oracle neé Sun neé MySQL AB.

So, in terms of usage, not really "niche", since it's quite mainstream.

But it terms of the clients they could possibly have, yeah, I suppose it's pretty limited, since the small shops don't need corporate support, and the big ones can deal with the issues on their own.

I'm referring to this all from a business perspective, not usage. I understand MySQL is used a lot by freeloaders. It's just irrelevant to me.

[DanS]

I'll hand it to Sun. They have managed to bring together an array of products that Larry Ellison wants to kill. That's value of a sort.

[Murg]

I work for a business software company and Im very interested in this news. Understanding that profits arent nearly as important as margins this is the hierarchy of margins in business IT:

1. Software- once you are past your development costs licensing is pure profit, the margin is awesome.

2. Services- good return but the headcount can be expensive, average margins.

3. Hardware- low return, very little profit per piece even for high end developers like Sun and IBM, low margins.

The hierarchy means that hardware companies love getting into services, it improves their margins. Meanwhile software companies often keep services arms around to support their products, but they typically dilute margins (even if they are profitable).

So in this deal we have a software company (mostly) buying a hardware company (mostly). It going to wreck their margins if they try to maintain Sun's business model.

But I think Oracle is a very smart company. So I dont think they are interested in continuing Sun's business model. Instead I think they bought Sun for the following:

1. The name, despite Sun's woes of the past few years they are a major player in the industry with a long past to be proud of.

2. OS Talent. What sun does, it does very well. I think Oracle wants a cutting edge linux distro that they can sell their services on (so they don't have to bundle with others software or fight compatibility issues). They have played with it before but there is a big difference in the oracles OS talent and Suns.

3. Java talent. Oracle has world class database developers, of course. But as they expand their footprint into non-database functions (identity provisioning, systems management, etc) they need better application developers.

4. Sun's client list. Solaris is dying, Oracle wants to approach those customers with new ideas for server replacements. They want to talk about a new model for a datacenter on cheap hardware running their software to provide reliability rather than old expensive hardware.

I suspect this means that Solaris has suffered its death blow. Oracle may keep it around for maintenance for a few years, but I wouldnt expect to see any significant movement at all, and no new solaris specific hardware platforms.

Oracles challenge is going to be to retain all their new talent in a difficult economy (those that have skills they want) and keep the hardware division from pulling their margins down to far.

[Asher]

Fantastic post. Please hang out in the OT more.

[SlowwHand]

Oracle has one of the better Material Requirements Planning (MRP) software for manufacturing.

[Asher]

That's cause they didn't make it themselves.

[DanS]

Sloww: Is there a comparable SAP product for that?

[gjramsey]

Sloww: Is there a comparable SAP product for that?

Yep, it is currently called Supply Chain Management (SCM) and MRP is run between it and R/3.

SCM was called APO in earlier versions.