6 key take-aways from Gartner’s 2015 database management systems Magic Quadrant

MUMBAI, INDIA: Gartner recently released database management systems Magic Quadrant.

The report includes commercial and open source database vendors including relational database management systems (RDBMS), NoSQL databases, and in-memory databases with deployment models ranging from licensed software, public cloud or appliance.

The new report shows a heady mix of the conventional and the modern. While many vendors retained a spot in the top space, many broke hierarchy and replaced established ones, paving ways for newer technologies, and therefore, out-of-box thinking among the CIOs. So while IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP retained their positions in the DB space, Amazon Web Services (AWS) made a not so surprising entry to the club.

Listed below are the 6 key take-ways. The list is in alphabetic order.

AWS springs a surprise:
Amazon stood behind Oracle in the Leaders’ category.
AWS has two database offerings: Amazon RDS and Amazon DynamoDB. RDS offers mainstream databases such as Microsoft SQL, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL, and MariaDB as managed database platforms. DynamoDB is the key-value based managed NoSQL database offering.

Amazon launched its own database engine called Aurora as one of the supported engines of RDS. The choice it offers to its customers helped AWS grab a top slot, said Gartner.

Does it raise concern for traditional database vendors IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and SAP? Of course yes!

Hadoop has a field day:
As CIOs continue to earmark large investments in big data; it is encouraging news for mainstream Hadoop vendors such as Cloudeara, Hortonworks and MapR, who have made it to the Magic Quadrant.

According to Gartner, many Cloudera customers indicated an intention to purchase additional licenses, products or features in the next 12 months. Gartner found that one of the Hortonworks customers reported it as the second-largest database by volume and highest number of transactions processed per day. MapR is expanding its cloud offerings and auditing support through training and services.

Oracle loses top spot to Microsoft
Microsoft, with its focus on cloud-first strategy replaced Oracle to grab the top spot as a database provider in the Leaders’ Quadrant.

Gartner acknowledged that although Oracle is one of the widely deployed RDBMSs in the enterprise, but with cloud becoming the key differentiator, Oracle struggled to retain its market position.

All the same, it recognized Microsoft's recent investments in Azure DocumentDB—the managed NoSQL database in the cloud. SQL Server's hybrid capabilities to run on-premises and in the cloud also helped Microsoft move to the top slot, the research firm asserted.

Customers prefer flexible licensing models, aligning with the OPEX model of cloud. Gartner noted that a growing number of users expressed dissatisfaction with Oracle's draconian pricing and auditing policies. Customers are also concerned with vendor lock-in when adopting its appliance offerings such as Exadata and SuperCluster, the Gartner report said.

IBM database in bottom three:
Gartner reported that IBM’s customer base rated it in the bottom third for high transaction rates, and near the bottom for performance. It scored below the mean for high-speed ingestion and automated data distribution.

According to Gartner, though IBM has been expanding its portfolio of database offerings, its market share is steadily declining. In the recent past, it acquired a NoSQL database called Cloudant. The company also announced its support for Apache Spark.

SAP under cloud:
Although SAP currently has three offerings: SAP Adaptive Server Enterprise (ASE), SAP SQL Anywhere, and SAP HANA, customers expressed concern with the way SAP is pushing its agenda of making SAP HANA a general-purpose software platform.

The changing landscape:
According to Gartner, by 2017, operational DBMS vendors will converge multiple data models, relational and NoSQL, into a single data platform. The market will consolidate itself by 2018, through mergers, acquisitions and business failures.

Gartner predicts that by 2017, the term NoSQL will not be relevant as it ceases to distinguish database offerings. Major data platforms will unify relational and NoSQL database engines.