Ingres Prepares for Open-Source Market Push (
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Ingres executives are gearing up to make a strong open-source pitch to enterprises that have been working with the relational database for years on multiple platforms, including aging Unix systems that are due for replacement.SANTA CLARA, Calif.—Ingres is building partnerships and expanding its management team as the company prepares for life totally independent of its former corporate parent, Computer Associates International.
The company announced April 4 that it had formed a partnership with IT systems integrator Cognizant Technology Solutions, based in Teaneck, N.J., to support the deployment of Ingres open-source relational database systems to its customers.
Under the partnership, Cognizant has agreed to develop an Ingres database services practice, which will open a new market channel for Ingres. The deal represents Cognizants first partnership with an open-source database company.
Garnett and Berquist spoke at the Software 2006 conference here as part of a showcase of 20 privately held companies.
The Cognizant partnership is important because "there is a powerful customer base of active Ingres customers that was handed to us by CA," said Terry Garnett, Ingress chairman and CEO.
Some of these customers were running CA Unicenter systems management console and its eTrust security system with the Ingres database, he said.
"The real challenge, and the key reason we just added Cognizant as a partner, is getting out in front of those customers," Garnett said.
While CA owned the Ingres database for years, it wasnt aggressively marketing new installations of the relational database, he said.
CA announced in May 2004 that it was going to market the Ingres database under an open-source license.
In November 2005, CA announced that it was spinning off Ingres as an independent, privately owned company.
Click here to read more about Computer Associates spinoff of Ingres.
Ingres severed the last ownership link Nov. 7 2005 when CA turned over billing and revenue collection for Ingres products to the spinoff. This was Ingres opportunity "to call on our customers to convince them to shift a big piece of their architecture to open source over time," Garnett said.
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It shouldnt be hard to convince customers to deploy additional Ingres open-source database applications when they are already familiar with what the system can do.
The Ingres database, he said, may have a market penetration of as much as 5 percent of the Fortune 1,000.
Ingres may be able to achieve a 10 percent penetration, by offering the database as a lower-cost, open-source alternative to the top players, said Tom Berquist, Ingres recently hired chief financial officer.
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