Open source software (OSS) has long been recognized as an opportunity for cost savings in the enterprise beginning with Linux for operating systems. New research from Gartner has now verified that many organizations can now extend that savings to the database layer.

Today’s enterprise data infrastructure model calls for open source-based and proprietary solutions co-existing and database administrators to target applications with their most cost-effective solutions. Best practices now call for data center managers to:

Leverage the low cost of open source based databases for new, re-factored and easily migrated applications.
Reserve licenses for more costly traditional databases to accommodate growth in other areas due to hardware upgrades and enterprise resource planning (ERP) expansions.
“By 2018, more than 70% of new in-house applications will be developed on an OSDBMS, and 50% of existing commercial RDBMS instances will have been converted or will be in process,” predicts Gartner in a new research paper, State of Relational Open Source RDBMSs 2015.*

OSRDBMS Grows Up, Pushes Costs Down

“We believe that as much as 80% of the in-house developed application portfolio may be candidates to migrate, and 50% of existing commercial RDBMS instances will be converted by 2018,” stated the report, pointing out the great opportunity for organizations to realize costs savings through migrations and reiterating the large number of applications that will be migrated.

Two key factors are driving this adoption in relational OSDBMS:

• Lower total-cost-of-ownership.
• Growth in product maturity.

Lower TCO is now easier to realize with open source relational databases today than in years past. The growing available pricing information for the report, comparing Oracle with open source software vendors.

                                                    Source: Gartner (April 2015)

Product maturity is evident in some of the dramatic advances in PostgreSQL for enterprise-class features as well as the performance, security, and manageability enhancements that EDB integrates into its Postgres Plus Advanced Server database.

The result is that EDB’s Postgres Plus database is a powerful Open Source-based alternative for most applications. Global brands worldwide have deployed EDB’s Postgres Plus, including ABN AMRO, BVVA, Cisco, Deutsche Börse, Ericsson, KT, Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman and Tata Consultancy Services.

Postgres’ advanced technical capabilities and its legendary stability allow IT managers to continue innovating with Open Source-based technologies. IT managers are now aggressively deploying Postgres Plus to shift existing infrastructure costs into funding for new mobile, analytic and other differentiating customer applications. Gartner has now substantiated what many companies had long since discovered: EDB’s Postgres Plus is as good as traditional RDBMS’s for a fraction of the cost. And the cost transformation potential is enormous—enough to fund significant new project innovation.

EnterpriseDB and Postgres Plus have given enterprises a whole new future. It is a future where enterprise-class open source relational database management systems can offer performance and reliability at exceptional value with little to no risk involved. Gartner says it best—use Open Source relational DBMSs wherever possible. It’s a no-brainer.

Learn why Gartner levels such a prediction on the database industry by downloading  The State of Open Source RDBMSs, 2015.

Keith Alsheimer is Chief Marketing Office of EnterpriseDB.

*The State of Open Source RDBMSs, 2015, by Donald Feinberg and Merv Adrian, published April 21, 2015.