|
 Database
Mgmt. Systems
DBMS: The lion tamer
No company can function without data.
As the quantity of data needed for effective functioning keeps on
growing continuously, so will the need for database management software,
says Gaurav Patra
 |
| One trend that is already emerging is
that the customer is going to look at a database not as a product
but as a solution to his problem, says Tarun Malik |
The management of information has always
been a challenge to businesses of all sizes, which is why the database
management systems (DBMS) software market has acquired the importance
it has. In India, Oracle, Microsoft and IBM are the top three players
in this segment. According to IDC, these three have a collective
marketshare of around 75 percent, a dominance that is unlikely to
change in the near future. Though the IT industry stagnated last
year, the database market picked up. “We experienced good growth
in 2002 even though it was not up to our expectations,” says
Tarun Malik, Microsoft’s product manager for business tools.
IDC expects the information and data management
software segment to grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR)
of 17 percent till 2006. Says SPS Grover, Oracle’s director
for e-business, “We expect the overall database management
(DBM) market in India to grow by around 25-30 percent in the next
one to two years. If one talks about an IT solution, then database
is the solution.” Today, it is considered an integral part
of the IT set-up of any organisation. Even low-end enterprises are
considering the implementation of DBMS. “If the Indian solution
deployment is considered a fabric, information and data management
software and the systems integration service form the warp and weft
of it. The fact that deployment of any solution is as effective
and robust as the DBMS deployed to support it has been well understood
by Indian organisations,” comments S Sabyasachi, manager for
IDC India’s software and services group.
Trends
The DBMS segment is also experiencing some
unique trends, such as the movement towards delivering complete
IT architecture since it helps in bringing down the total cost of
ownership (TCO), which is what most organisations are demanding.
Says Grover, “Organisations are demanding common skills across
their entire IT infrastructure. They do not want middleware from
one vendor and collaborative application and DBM from another.”
In the last one year the industry has witnessed
the emergence of three-tier computing as a de facto standard. Consolidation,
standardisation and centralisation of IT systems have emerged as
upcoming trends. These trends are driven by the need to bring down
the TCO, the movement towards outsourcing, and the requirements
of security and disaster recovery—all of which are energising
the DBMS segment. Confirms Sabyasachi, “Last year the increased
pressure on and from top management to reduce costs and maintain
margins led organisations to deploy this technology, thus giving
an impetus to the market.” Increasing competition has also
forced companies to think about innovative business models. Con-sequently,
some of them have entered e-business, which in turn helped the DBM
market to grow.
Apart from this, one area that is fuelling
DBMS growth is e-governance. E-governance demands centralisation,
since fragmentation of information takes away its importance, hence
there is growing demand for DBMS in this segment. According to industry
sources, last year there was 30-40 percent growth in demand for
DBMS from the e-governance segment alone.
Other segments that contributed to DBMS
growth were banking and financial services. The Reserve Bank of
India’s directive to all banks to have a minimum number of
branches networked also acted as a positive catalyst. Says Vivek
Rawat, IBM India’s country manager for database management,
“Business intelligence, especially in the financial and telecom
sectors, is becoming a key differentiator.” The growing adoption
of enterprise applications, including customer relationship management
(CRM), enterprise relationship management (ERM) and supply chain
managment (SCM), and the deployment of query and reporting tools,
executive information systems, data mining applications and packaged
software data marts have also fuelled the growth of this space.
Still, this segment was also affected by
the general economic slowdown, although not to a great extent. September
11 and the Indo-Pak stand-off also had an impact on this space,
as did the dot-com crash.
How will the
market shape up?
IDC expects this software category to reach nearly $80 million by
2006. “Two positive characteristics of this market are that
it is in a mature stage of the product life cycle, and that it has
a larger base,” observes Sabyasachi. A larger base means the
market is basically spread out. So what is happening is that apart
from enterprises that are using databases in terms of clusters,
mid-tier and small and medium enterprise (SME) organisations are
also finding it very easy to adopt. In days to come, organisations
will be looking at more of a solutions scenario. “The customer
is going to look at a database not as a product but as a solution
to his problem, a trend that is already emerging,” declares
Malik.
He expects the market to post healthy growth
this year: “We are expecting around 15-20 percent growth this
fiscal. Both the enterprise and SME markets are growing at a very
good pace; the coming months should see a lot of SMEs opting for
a solutions service, which will help the segment to grow.”
Also, thanks to this year’s budget, corporate spending is expected
to increase in 2003, which will improve the growth prospects of
DBMS.
Today, most organisations are demanding
better value for money, and not better features. The emphasis is
on how to run the company in a more cost-effective way. “One
of the most important trends in this market segment is the shift
from mere box-selling to end-to-end solutions and better integration.
Organisations are now more IT-savvy, and have realised that IT plays
a major role in cutting down cost and simultaneously running the
business smoothly,” points out Malik. In other words, most
organisations are expecting DBM solutions to drive down the TCO.
Nevertheless, because of the consolidation
happening, in the next one to two years it is expected that major
vendors will work to improve features relating to scalability, availability,
interoperability and security. It is also expected that there will
be increased offtake of DBMS by SMEs in the next two years; the
penetration of companies like Oracle and Microsoft into this space
is already on the rise.
On the applications front, locational and
spatial applications are being built on the database, and people
are now trying to exploit these applications; for instance, the
locational and geographic information as part of the transactional
data. These applications are becoming important for e-governance.
The demand for databases on PDAs is also
expected to grow, especially on those PDAs used by marketing personnel
in the field. (Oracle has incorporated this aspect in its IT blueprint.)
The ERP and regular inventory kind of applications
have emerged as the standard applications running on databases.
Web services are also emerging. Databases are becoming more self-tuning
and delivering throughput on their own. This is what organisations
are demanding so that they can provide more value to the business
rather than looking after their IT infrastructure. In the next two
years, one expects to see a lot of consolidation happening in the
enterprise market, which means there will be focus on solutions
based on applications like data warehousing and Web services integration.
- Vendors are moving towards
delivering the complete IT architecture as it helps in bringing
down the TCO
- More emphasis on security
- Vendors have recognised the
increasing need/demand for databases for PDAs
- Vendors will work on improving
features relating to scalability, availability, interoperability
and security
- Vendors will try and meet
the user demand for standardisation, consolidation and centralisation
|
- The Information and Data Management
software market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 17 percent
over 2001 to 2006. This software category is likely to grow
to nearly $80 million by 2006, thus exhibiting a moderate
growth rate.
- Vertical segments like banking
and other financial services, telcos and the government,
especially the e-governance space, are going to drive this
market.
- Despite being under pressure
the market will continue to grow and will be fuelled by
query and reporting tools, executive information systems,
data mining and packaged data marts, among others.
- Three vendors—Oracle,
IBM, and Microsoft dominate the Indian market. And IDC believes
that the competitive landscape is not likely to change in
near future. Put together, these three players enjoy a 75
percent share of the total market.
Source: IDC
|
|
Banking/Financial Market
- High competition
- Better customer management
Telecom
- Growth in the Internet
- Growth in wireless networks
Manufacturing
- Demand for inventory access
and ordering via the Web
- Development of product document
management
Retail
- New distribution methods open
up markets for new competitors
- Proliferation of object-oriented
languages
- Need for one-to-one customer
relationships
Government
- Automation of government processes
- Military planning and training
simulations
- Need to replace legacy systems
Healthcare
- Drive to reduce costs and
increase quality of care
- Goal of a unified patient
record
- Switch to managed care
|
|
- Overall worldwide DBMS market
(across all DBMS types) totals approximately $9 billion
- Growth rates (CAGR 2003-2006)
for the three main DBMS types are:
- Pre-relational (e.g. IBM’s
IMS): 0.5%
- Relational: 4.1%
- Object: -2.7%
- Oracle is the current marketshare
leader with IBM close behind (especially with the integration
of the numbers from its Informix DBMS acquisition), with
Microsoft in third place.
Strengths and challenges for
the top three players:
- Oracle
- + Product leadership and
functionality differentiation.
- - However, past-pricing
and sales missteps have resulted in the perception of
it being a difficult vendor to work with.
- IBM’s DB2
- + Competes effectively
with Oracle in scalability, availability and performance,
and has the backing of many application vendors that
compete with Oracle in the applications space.
- - Continued challenges
in RDBMS focus and attempts to migrate Informix users
to DB2 rather than losing them to Oracle or SQL Server.
Not a huge issue in India, given the lower penetration
of Informix here.
- Microsoft
- + Widely perceived as
the low-cost leader with continued progress in the RDBMS
market.
- - Continued Window-only
positioning is limiting at the high-end. Conversely
as it does make headway at the higher-end, increases
in cost and complexity will erode its image as the cost-leader.
Three key factors for DBMS market
size growth and vendor share growth
- Add-On Product Evolution/Growth
Vendors are increasingly attempting to add new functionality
to the core DBMS, like content and storage management, BI,
etc. and redefining the DBMS as an enterprise platform.
This approach will meet with limited success in the Indian
market.
- Cost vs. ROI
There will be an extensive focus on RoI of any incremental
investments, including looking at server consolidation exercises,
proceeding with key strategic objectives only. In India
there is a renewed focus on achieving the RoI from earlier
investments in ERP, SCM, CRM and other three-letter acronyms.
This will potentially drive the need for additional DBMS
investments, since enterprises will look to leverage these
past investments through better overall data management
and access capabilities for value-added decision making
support, client information access, etc.
- Complete Solution Sell
The trend towards buying a DBMS as part of an overall solution
has been quite prevalent in India and will continue to be
so even in the second wave of the TLA (three-letter acronym)
barrage. However, as enterprises mature in their usage of
IT as a key value enhancer to the enterprise, and as concepts
like the RTE (real-time enterprise) begin to take hold in
India, there will start a contrary trend to look at DBMS
purchases as part of an overall IT architecture plan, and
independent of specific solution purchases or expansions
by enterprises.
Partha Iyengar VP, Research
Director, Pune, India
|
|
The leader in the database management
systems (DBMS) space, Oracle is expecting the overall database
management (DBM) market in India to grow around 25-30 percent
within the next two years. The company is into not just DBM
but complete IT architecture offerings. It has recognised
the trend towards delivering the complete IT architecture
since this helps in bringing down the total cost of ownership
(TCO). This angle is what Oracle is going to exploit in the
next fiscal.
Consolidation, standardisation
and centralisation are some of the emerging requirements in
the DBM space. Oracle has stood to gain because its DBM offerings
are targeted to meet these requirements.
The crunch in IT spending in
2002 did not affect the company’s growth since the corporate
demand for DBMS has been steady. What really helped Oracle
in this space was the fact that the low-end of the corporate
market moved to the high-end. According to the company, the
low-end is where Microsoft competes with Oracle since they
(Oracle) are very strong in the high-end segment.
The company is also expecting
to benefit from the growth and spread of Linux, since its
DBM solutions support the Linux OS. This, according to Oracle,
forms an important part of its strategy for the DBM business.
The company also aims to exploit the demand for databases
on PDAs.
E-governance is one segment that
Oracle will focus to a great extent. Other segments the company
is targeting are financial services, manufacturing and telecom.
Providing total architecture
at the lowest TCO is Oracle’s strategy for the future.
Oracle is expecting the overall
database management (DBM) market in India to grow around 25-30
percent within the next two years, says SPS Grover
|
|
The combined strength of IBM’s
data management products, based on its flagship database,
DB2, powers some of the most demanding solutions. IBM also
provides customers with integrated solutions for database
management, content management and business intelligence.
DB2 is a multimedia, Web-ready,
relational database management system, strong enough to meet
the demands of large corporations, and flexible enough to
serve medium-sized and small e-businesses. According to company
sources, worldwide, IBM has been experiencing double-digit
growth for the past 24 quarters. It is also experiencing good
growth in the Indian market, and expects that to continue.
IBM considers India to be one of the most important markets
in Asia, which probably explains why it has been making a
lot of investments in this country, be it in Gurgaon or Bangalore.
The company intends to continue its partnership with various
vendors for DB2. IBM is one of the preferred partners of SAP
and Unix. Today, its DBMS business in India has more than
300 customers.
The company has realised that
customers are opting more for accuracy (resulting in an increase
in decision support systems), and that business intelligence,
especially in the financial and telecom sectors, is becoming
a key differentiator. Not surprisingly, the company is paying
special attention to these two sectors.
Meanwhile, IBM continues to target
verticals like banking (more workflow solutions), insurance,
telecom (total content management) and manufacturing (more
archival and drawing applications). IBM is one of those DBM
companies that support the broadest range of platforms. DB2
supports more than 22 IBM and non-IBM platforms, including
Linux, Sun, HP and Windows. Again, IBM was the first database
software vendor to support standards-based Web services including
XML, UDDI and SOAP. The company also provides customers with
one of the lowest TCOs in the industry, including overall
product price and the people required to deploy, manage and
maintain their databases. Leading independent software vendors—including
SAP, Siebel, PeopleSoft and JD Edwards—have chosen DB2
as their preferred database platform for new applications.
At present there are more than 16,000 partners and 26,000
applications based on IBM’s data management portfolio
across the globe.
In 2003, the company is planning
to introduce knowledge management solutions. IBM is also working
on archiving
solutions for Lotus Notes and Exchange. Integration of CRM
solutions, especially in PeopleSoft and Siebel, is another
area on which the company will be focusing this year. Apart
from this, IBM will also focus on open computing, and will
continue to deliver on the Linux platform. Content management
is another area which IBM is planning to exploit this year;
there is already a whole suite of products available from
the company. Apart from this, the company has also recognised
the thrust on packaged applications, and has been putting
a lot of focus on ISVs worldwide. In the case of India, the
company plans to increase the number of ISVs in the DMS space
to 100. Above all, IBM will try and extract maximum mileage
from its acquisition of Informix.
IBM considers India to be one
of the most important markets in Asia, which probably explains
why it has been making a lot of investments in this country
|
|
Microsoft is targeting the DBMS
segment quite aggressively. It has recently announced that
its SQL Server business intelligence (BI) platform will include
reporting capabilities in future. The company is planning
to release a beta test version of the software in the first
half of this year. Microsoft aims to deliver enterprise reporting
functionality, which demonstrates its commitment to bring
improved business insight to every employee at every level.
In this, the .NET framework is also going to be a key driver
for Microsoft.
According to the company, by
extending the reach of information to the entire enterprise,
SQL Server Reporting Services will enable a broader set of
employees to make better decisions faster. With the combination
of SQL Server Analysis Services and Reporting Services, developers
will be able to extend applications to provide embedded reporting
and analysis solutions that are both cost-effective and easy
to use.
Experts believe that CIOs will
be pleased to see Microsoft making a significant investment
in the reporting industry since it adds to the best-in-class
interactive analytic solutions.
The company hopes to generate
good business both from the SME and corporate space. For SMEs,
Microsoft has specific partners for different regions of India.
The company uses its technical resources and experts to educate
and train these partners on database-based solutions; there
is training in SQL Server, what’s new in SQL Server,
and how to adapt it to the customers’ situations. The
company has already rolled out this training programme in
the north and east, and is in the process of doing so in the
west and south. Other segments targeted by Microsoft are manufacturing,
IT services and telecom.
This year has been extremely
good for Microsoft’s database business. Next year the
company will definitely try and narrow Oracle’s lead;
it expects to grow beyond the market rate.
Microsoft hopes to generate
good business both from the SME and corporate space
|
|
