Comments | spurkis: Sun to buy MySQL

spurkis

Sun to buy MySQL - why?

Jan 16, 2008 15:46

Wow... I didn't see this coming! (Unfortunately the original announcement wasn't loading for me). From an Open Source POV, it makes sense as Sun has long been a supporter of & contributor to OSS. It's just strange to see what I picture as essentially a hardware company buying a database company... And besides, if they had IPO'd I'd have ( Read more... )

sun, it strategy, mysql

Comments 4

2shortplanks January 17 2008, 10:17:08 UTC

Interesting. You see Sun as a hardware company. I see them as those people who made Java.

anonymous March 6 2008, 16:12:29 UTC

Yes, with Java very much a software company. But on the server space they are a *solutions* company. Hardware - OS - MySQL - J2EE. This purchase nicely enhances their offering doesn't it?

Tony

good point spurkis March 7 2008, 11:59:53 UTC

That makes sense. Maybe I've been mistaken in seeing Sun as solely a hardware company... Even still, being able to deliver & support an entire stack like that will only boost their hardware sales. It'd be interesting to look at their balance sheets to see where the money gets made ;-)

Re: good point anonymous March 12 2008, 08:57:43 UTC

I know one thing first hand - they charge a hell of a lot of money for Java licensing! (But claim Java isn't that profitable).

Yes, it'd be interesting to see their most profitable product line. I should imagine the support contracts are highly profitable. I know they did a lot of consultancy work for Ebay in the early days - creating heavy duty web servers and fixing it when the sheer load broke it. They also supplied high-end hardware and of course the OS Solaris. If I had to guess on the most profitable area (and it is a sheer guess) I'd say solutions consultancy was their most profitable niche, followed closely by support contracts. I would imagine their education services are very profitable too.

Oh well, mostly speculation on my part.... :)