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EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 12:27 PM EDT

The EU Commission has just released a press release. They are not going to approve the Oracle takeover of Sun just yet anyway. Instead they are launching an in depth investigation of the deal, and it's MySQL that seems to be the issue. Here's the press release. This doesn't mean it won't happen, and the deadline for a final result of the investigation is January 19, 2010. But they are certainly asking the right question, namely, what happens to MySQL in Oracle's hands?
The proposed transaction would bring together two major competitors in the market for databases. The database market is highly concentrated with the three main competitors of proprietary databases – Oracle, IBM and Microsoft – controlling approximately 85% of the market in terms of revenue. Oracle is the market leader in proprietary databases, while Sun's MySQL database product is the leading open source database.

The Commission’s preliminary market investigation has shown that the Oracle databases and Sun's MySQL compete directly in many sectors of the database market and that MySQL is widely expected to represent a greater competitive constraint as it becomes increasingly functional. The Commission's investigation has also shown that the open source nature of Sun's MySQL might not eliminate fully the potential for anti-competitive effects. In its in-depth investigation, the Commission will therefore address a number of issues, including Oracle's incentive to further develop MySQL as an open source database.

Isn't that exactly what you've been wondering? More information on the case as it continues will be available here.

*************************

Brussels, 3 September 2009

Mergers: Commission opens in-depth investigation into proposed takeover of Sun Microsystems by Oracle

The European Commission has opened an in-depth investigation under the EU Merger Regulation into the planned acquisition of US hardware and software vendor Sun Microsystems by Oracle Corporation, a US database and application software company. The Commission’s initial market investigation indicated that the proposed acquisition would raise serious doubts as to its compatibility with the Single Market because of competition concerns on the market for databases. The decision to open an in-depth inquiry does not prejudge the final result of the investigation. The Commission now has 90 working days, until 19 January 2010, to take a final decision on whether the concentration would significantly impede effective competition within the European Economic Area (EEA) or a substantial part of it.

Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said: “The Commission has to examine very carefully the effects on competition in Europe when the world's leading proprietary database company proposes to take over the world's leading open source database company. In particular, the Commission has an obligation to ensure that customers would not face reduced choice or higher prices as a result of this takeover. Databases are a key element of company IT systems. In the current economic context, all companies are looking for cost-effective IT solutions, and systems based on open-source software are increasingly emerging as viable alternatives to proprietary solutions. The Commission has to ensure that such alternatives would continue to be available”.

Oracle is active in the development, manufacture and distribution of company software, including middleware (i.e. software that connects software components applications), database software and business application software and related services.

Sun offers computing infrastructure, including server and storage solutions and middleware and database software.

The proposed transaction would bring together two major competitors in the market for databases. The database market is highly concentrated with the three main competitors of proprietary databases – Oracle, IBM and Microsoft – controlling approximately 85% of the market in terms of revenue. Oracle is the market leader in proprietary databases, while Sun's MySQL database product is the leading open source database.

The Commission’s preliminary market investigation has shown that the Oracle databases and Sun's MySQL compete directly in many sectors of the database market and that MySQL is widely expected to represent a greater competitive constraint as it becomes increasingly functional. The Commission's investigation has also shown that the open source nature of Sun's MySQL might not eliminate fully the potential for anti-competitive effects. In its in-depth investigation, the Commission will therefore address a number of issues, including Oracle's incentive to further develop MySQL as an open source database.

  


EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal | 122 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Corrections Here
Authored by: feldegast on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 12:34 PM EDT
So they can be fixed

---
IANAL
My posts are ©2004-2009 and released under the Creative Commons License
Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0
P.J. has permission for commercial use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Newspicks Discussion Here
Authored by: red floyd on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 12:40 PM EDT
Please put the subject of the newspick as your title.

---
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a *CITIZEN* of the United
States of America.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Off Topic Here
Authored by: red floyd on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 12:41 PM EDT
On-topic posters will be sentenced to the following:

6 nonstop hours of listening to RMS singing the GNU song.

---
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a *CITIZEN* of the United
States of America.

[ Reply to This | # ]

EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 01:10 PM EDT
As a European Citizen I must admit that I'll follow this case very close. I'm
also a GNU/Linux user, having a few websites on Unix hosted servers with the
great MySQL database keeping track of a few PHP engines running my CMS sites.

I doubt that Oracle has any interest in the Open Source MySQL part which they no
doubt look forward to be able to shut down. Sadly. Who's gonna take the place of
MySQL? I guess that there'll be a long gab in empty space until a new DB gets
the popularity and functionality of MySQL.

Maybe I'm just plain wrong here. But this seem to be the end of MySQL as we know
it. I can't see how legislation can do anything in this matter without
interfering with the companies right to do with their products as they please.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Does EU have a say in a purchase of one US company by another?
Authored by: boban on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 01:27 PM EDT
While they are asking the right questions, isn't this matter in US jurisdiction?
Or has EU inherited jurisdiction because Sun bought MySQL, a Swedish company?

[ Reply to This | # ]

EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 01:28 PM EDT
This is ridiculous!

Anyone can simply take the MySQL code and relabel it.

It has already happened - two examples are Ice Weasel and CentOS.

So any "anti competitive" concerns are completely stupid.

The EU obviously doesn't understand open source.

I hope that "what happens to MySQL in Oracle's hands" was a rhetorical
question. It should be obvious to PJ and everyone that the MySQL source code is
freely available, and any smart company (Red Hat or CentOS or Suse etc) can
repackage it.

[ Reply to This | # ]

MySQL under Sun
Authored by: rsteinmetz70112 on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 06:13 PM EDT
How was MySQL working out under Sun?

I don't follow it that closely but was Sun fully supporting it and was
development moving forward?

If Sun Oracle were to be approved only if MySQL were to be spun off somehow who
would do development? Worst case Microsoft could buy it to bury it.

---
Rsteinmetz - IANAL therefore my opinions are illegal.

"I could be wrong now, but I don't think so."
Randy Newman - The Title Theme from Monk

[ Reply to This | # ]

EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Authored by: argel on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 06:30 PM EDT
Oracle already owns InnoDB, the best (well, most feature rich) database storage
engine for My-SQL. For example, if you want to be able to use foreign keys then
you need to use InnoDB. So this investigation by the EU seems a bit excessive.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Sadly, the delay kills off Sun
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 03 2009 @ 08:54 PM EDT
Every day of delay means that Dell, HP and IBM take over more of the Sun space.
By the time Oracle gets to do something with it, it will be worthless.

[ Reply to This | # ]

EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 04 2009 @ 02:39 PM EDT

as long as there is postgresql, it doesn't really matter if the technically
inferior mysql is hampered or not

[ Reply to This | # ]

EU Commission Opens In Depth Investigation of Sun-Oracle Deal
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 04 2009 @ 02:56 PM EDT
I'd like to seem them launch of an in depth investigation of the Yahoo/Microsoft
Bling "partnership"!

[ Reply to This | # ]
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