Re: informix market share

From: rkusenet <rkusenet_at_yahoo.com>
Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 20:49:23 -0500
Message-ID: <Dg8if.35805$gK4.1149183@news20.bellglobal.com>

"Serge Rielau" <srielau_at_ca.ibm.com> wrote:-

> Informix IDS 9 is recommended by IBM for Apps exploiting OO as well as apps requiring the DBMS
> runs OLTP embedded.
>
> Informix IDS has been and still is after what .. 5 years with IBM(?)... the backbone of >90% of
> 911 call centers in the US. Can't be that bad then and ain't going anywhere....

Add to it, IDS runs on 20 out of 25 top grocery chains in North America, and about 80% of all retail shops like Wal-Mart, Sears etc.

I have not heard of one significant customer in the above industry switching to Oracle after IBM bought Informix. On the contrary Wal-Mart.com switched to Informix from Oracle. [ Wal-Mart.com is separate from Wal-Mart stores ].

Much I like Informix (though I stopped working with it for about a year now), I also think it is toast for reasons totally different. What is happening is that Informix skilled people are rapidly shrinking, just like Sybase and other fading products. In my last project I worked with some UK folks and was shocked to learn that they were exposed to only one RDBMS: SQL Server, right thru their college days. Little bit of research told me that this trend is bit global with most of the fresh graduates hardly proficient in lesser known databases. Received on Sat Nov 26 2005 - 19:49:23 CST