IBM STG Trip Report Part 1: Hardware-Software Synergy Yielding Dividends
Every year in the fourth quarter, IBM assembles its Systems & Technology Group (STG – the hardware guys) executives for discussions with the analyst community to review results and discuss the year ahead. STG’s Senior VP Rod Adkins teed up this year’s meeting with a reminder that STG and Software Group (SWG) both now report [...]
IBM’s IOD Showcases DB2, Informix, InfoSphere. Now, About Marketing….
It was hard to decide where to look first in Las Vegas this year at IBM’s flagship information management event. Coming as it did on the heels of a massive, sprawling Oracle Open World, it was also overwhelming, but distinguished itself immediately by its focus. Whereas Oracle has smashed together hardware systems, apps, middleware, java [...]
Database Benchmarks – The Gift That Keeps on Giving
Yes, I know – not everyone believes database benchmarks are useful. My position is that there is value in benchmarks’ role in helping engineers wring out bottlenecks, bugs and performance impediments in their products. In a conversation I recently had with Berni Schiefer, Distinguished Engineer and manager of the DB2 UDB Performance and Advanced Technology [...]
More TDWI Notes – ParAccel Rolling On, HP Stalled, Vertica Leading Insurgents
On my second day at TDWI, I was in meetings all day – events like this are a great opportunity for analysts to catch up with many of the companies they follow at one time, and this particular one was packed with sponsors. Congrats to the folks who sell sponsorships – they had a packed [...]
EMC Buys Greenplum – Big Data Realignment Continues
EMC’s acquisition of Greenplum, announced today as a cash transaction, reaffirms the obvious: the Big Data tsunami upends conventional wisdom. It has already reshaped the market, spawning the most ferment in the RDBMS (and non-R DBMS via the noSQL players) space in years. When I first posted on Greenplum over a year ago, I said [...]
Oracle Exadata: Early Signs Promising
Exadata is looking good. In the past few months, I’ve had the chance to talk to several early adopters of Oracle Exadata V2, some in connection with a sponsored white paper Oracle has just published. It’s still early, but I see this product as a milestone, regardless of its commercial success. That is still to [...]
Can IBM POWER 7 hit the C-spot?
I attended a briefing last week in London with Rod Adkins, SVP IBM Systems and Technology Group, and Robert LeBlanc, who runs IBM’s middleware business. The subject at hand was the new POWER7 chip. If you’re not a hardcore IBM server customer you’ve possibly never heard of POWER. It runs IBM’s mainframes, Unix boxes and [...]
