Is Oracle 11g not yet as successful as we may have been led to believe?
According to Pythian Group CEO Paul Vallee, the answer is yes. Vallee claims his research shows that Oracle 11g is being adopted at slower rates than earlier Oracle databases - and Oracle Corp. will neither comment nor provide numbers showing otherwise.
Pythian Group is an enterprise database management service that manages 718 production databases for 56 Oracle customers. Vallee says that only 3 out of the 718 databases are running 11g (which was released last July).
As I wrote last month, IDC reported that Oracle has increased its database market share. IDC analyst Carl Olofson said Oracle told him that 10% of users expressed intent to upgrade to 11g. According to Olofson, “that would be an unusually high adoption rate for the first year.”
In the Network World article, Vallee says that, based on his numbers from Pythian, “he can say with 95% confidence that no more than 3.66% of Oracle databases are running 11g. With 50% confidence, he says it’s unlikely that even 1% use 11g.” Vallee calls Pythian “a robust sample” of Oracle customers, sufficient for use in statistical studies.
Vallee acknowledged that it might be unrealistic for Oracle to know exactly how many customers are using 11g, but the number of support requests they receive for help with 11g would be a good indication.
However, Oracle declined a request by Network World to provide any support numbers. They also declined to comment on Vallee’s claims, “instead providing links to a few documents, none of which show how many Oracle customers have adopted 11g.”
There’s nothing unusual about a slow adoption rate for a new release - so why would Oracle be reluctant to admit one? (If Vallee’s findings are valid). And, while it may be true that “organizations worldwide adopt Oracle 11g,” just how many organizations is it,