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Sun Buys MySQL
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Wed Jan 16, 2008 09:03 AM
from the didn't-see-that-coming dept.
from the didn't-see-that-coming dept.
Krow alerted me that MySQL has been bought by Sun. Right now there is only a brief announcement but it discusses what the acquisition will mean for the core developers, community etc.
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News: Oracle Buys BEA 115 comments
In an event not as surprising as this morning's buyout announcement, but still noteworthy, Oracle has purchased BEA Systems. The middleware maker was snapped up for the sum of $8.5 billion, the second offer Oracle put forward. "BEA had long been considered a prime takeover target in an industry that has been consolidating for several years, but BEA executives had repeatedly dismissed Oracle's overtures, saying the company could perform better independently. Mr. Icahn began buying up BEA shares last summer, and today owns 13 percent of the company. The deal makes Oracle the undisputed leader in the market for middleware, business software that gets its name from its role as a layer of programming code that resides between a company's database system and the payroll, human resources and inventory systems that use the same data."
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Technology: What is an Open Source Company Really Worth? 82 comments
CNet has an interesting profile of MySQL, JBoss, and Zimbra, exploring what an open source company is actually worth. "Given how slowly revenue accumulates in an open-source company--assuming it is recognizing subscriptions over 12 months--bookings is probably the valuation metric being used or at least strongly considered. It surely is the metric by which the start-up wishes to be measured. So while Savio suggests we open-source entrepreneurs may be "sleeping with dollar signs in (our) eyes," there's clearly a lot of work to do before most open-source companies are worth selling. It's not worth selling out for $100 million. Not for the venture-backed companies, anyway."
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Can Sun Make MySQL Pay? 273 comments
AlexGr submitted a nice followup to last weeks billion dollar Sun buyout of MySQL. He notes that "Jeff Gould presents an interesting analysis in Interop News:
How can an open source software company with $70 million or so in revenue and no profits to speak of be worth $1 billion? That's the question Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz has been trying to answer since he bought MySQL last week.
Like most commercial open source companies, MySQL makes money by enticing well-heeled customers to pay for an enterprise version of its product that comes with more bells and whistles than the community version it gives away for free.
It appears though that the additional features of the Enterprise version are not enough to compensate for the revenue-destroying effects of the free Community alternative. What else could explain the surprising fact that MySQL has quietly filled out its open source portfolio with a closed source proprietary management software tool known as Enterprise Software Monitor?"
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IT: Sun Snags Open Source Virtualization Company, Innotek 49 comments
BobB writes to mention Sun has acquired Innotek, open source desktop virtualization vendor. "VirtualBox will remain free of charge under Sun and be placed in the company's xVM portfolio of virtualization products, Steve Wilson, Sun's vice president of xVM, wrote in a blog posting. 'If we're going to continue to give it away, why is Sun investing in VirtualBox? In short, because the developers that build applications have a huge amount of influence on how they're deployed," Wilson wrote in his blog. "We believe that developers using VirtualBox can help guide their friends in the data center towards xVM Server as the preferred deployment engine. Beyond that, I think there is a huge opportunity to link with Sun's other developer-related assets like NetBeans, Glassfish and (soon) MySQL.'"
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I wonder (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I wonder (Score:5, Interesting)
Homo homini lupus
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Re:I wonder (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:I wonder (Score:5, Funny)
One can only hope that they will be using this to replace the database that comes in Open Office.
I figured MS was paying them to include the current one to make Access look good by comparison.
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Re:I wonder (Score:5, Informative)
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Licenses (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Licenses (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Licenses (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Licenses (Score:5, Interesting)
Mod parent insightful, please!
I recall reading that MySQL AB really didn't stand a chance to force the GPL (and therefore, move to their proprietary license) on programs that connected to the database because that was "dynamically linking". Dude, WTF? Using protocols to communicate to a program or service is NOT linking! I got so angry when I read the news on the License change, that I wanted to tag the story "greedybastards".
But if MySQL AB told the truth, then nobody would buy their ultra-expensive license.
On the other hand, Sun and their promotion of Open Office (and open formats) is a proper example of Free software.
Let's hope things change for the good (for example, re-releasing the MySQL client software to LGPL or GPL+linking exception).
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Not a rash move (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.news.com/2100-7344_3-5562799.html [news.com]
Re:Not a rash move (Score:5, Interesting)
But I think most people thought Sun might push PostgreSQL [sun.com] which is a nice database. Not sure why Sun would purchase MySQL, seems like an expensive PR move. I for one have seen Sun's product support deteriorate over the years, and hope they keep support for MySQL independent of the main line support. Or maybe this plays into Oracle as Oracle had or has an alliance with Sun. Is this alliance strained?
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Here is the PR (Score:5, Informative)
"As part of the transaction, Sun will pay approximately $800 million in cash in exchange for all MySQL stock and assume approximately $200 million in options."
Re:Here is the PR (Score:5, Interesting)
Perhaps Sun will be playing around with open sourcing some more of their hardware as a pseudo way of moving away from hardware, without actually losing all their hardware aquisitions.
But it is interesting to see how open source as a business model is evolving by allowing competitors to leverage off each other and still compete. Maybe what we are looking at is the "horizontalisation" of the market, I note that with speculation about an open sourcing of DB2 and Oracle databases, Microsoft's position in the market looks more and more isolated every day.
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Why did they buy it? (Score:5, Funny)
What happens now with Oracle and PostgtreSQL? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think this is a move to sell support to their customers, like asking: "Do you need an Oracle Database?"
- If the answer is "YES", then we will sell you our servers and OS support
- If the answer is "NO", then we will sell you our servers and OS support AND MySQL / PostgreSQL support
There is a very good entry on a Sun blog about the cost of propietary databases and the "commodization" of this market:
http://blogs.sun.com/jkshah/entry/cost_of_proprietary_database [sun.com]
So why would SUN buy MYSQL - discussion! (Score:5, Interesting)
I thought SUN was currently bundling postgresql guess that wasn't good enough...
So up for discussion why buy mysql?
* Well you can't buy postgresql.....(Who to buy?)
* Wanting to hurt redhat
* You get ownership of the code (Since mysql has)
The "hurting redhat" is more for journalists "lets find a conflict thinking"
What else are the reasons?
Jonathan Schwartz's Blog (Score:5, Informative)
http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/ [sun.com]
It would make MySQL easier to deploy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Dificult to say... (Score:5, Interesting)
Sun owns Java. Sun will soon own MySQL. If you have a Tomcat/J2EE environment running open source, you will soon be having to deal with a single vendor with control over your environment, because most systems only give lip service to PostgreSQL but fully support MySQL. Expect the support bills to go up.
On to RedHat and IBM, I think it is time for them to start funding the PostgreSQL project for real. Setup a more corporate entity to guide it and REALLY compensate the guys like Tom, Bruce, et. al. for so much hard work, which IMHO is above and beyond a standard pay check.
Oracle in Java (Score:5, Interesting)
Great news (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sun? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Sun? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Sun? (Score:5, Funny)
And I even baked them a cake shaped like the internet!
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Re:Great news (Score:5, Informative)
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