Database decisions: AWS has changed the game for IT

At the recently held AWS Summit, it was clear that Amazon had acquired OpenSCG—a company that supported PostgreSQL, the popular open source object relational database management system (ORDBMS). The move was in sync with Amazon’s strategy of acquiring companies whose products can complement the services that Amazon builds in-house. As enterprises figure out the database requirements that their latest applications may require, Amazon intends to be ready to cater to their needs with minimal effort. The company’s ability to support NoSQL, DynamoDB, MongoDB and now PostgreSQL, makes Amazon an “every database store.”

Amazon’s move to acquire PostgreSQL does not surprise the experts, given the niche expertise available with OpenSCG to help companies migrate to PostgreSQL. Having moved over 64,000 databases into various servers and looking to migrate to a greater magnitude of data in the coming years, the acquisition of OpenSCG does not come as a surprise.

Amazon’s acquisition of OpenSCG is likely to change the way developers think of database solutions, which is bound to impact other giants like Oracle and Microsoft. The strong point of these companies was that they collectively own three of the world’s largest database systems—Oracle DBMS, MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server. However, it is said that “Oracle has missed the market transition to big data.” Further, as Amazon moves its database services into serverless functions, metadata can be mined faster with greater efficiency—a move that Amazon’s competitors need to take serious note of. With Google and Microsoft rushing to increase their footprint in the database realm through serverless functions, the market looks poised for greater dynamism.