Informix is pursuing several strategies to complement its database and tools business.
While Oracle and Sybase come to mind first when thinking of relational database technology for the Unix platform, Informix Corp. claims the largest installed base of relational database engines running on Unix. (See "Informix on the Move," DBMS, November 1995, page 46.) Furthermore, Informix appears to be focused more specifically on a mission statement to deliver "... the best technology and services for developing enterprisewide data management applications for open systems." Something must be working right. Informix's 1995 revenue ($709 million) and net income ($105.3 million) are up by more than 50 percent and 59 percent, respectively, compared to 1994. (See Table 1, page 44.) This puts Informix on track to join the ranks of other billion dollar software businesses within the next year or two.
Founded in 1980 by Roger Sippl, Informix went public in 1986 and released its current top-of-the-line product, the OnLine Dynamic Server RDBMS, in 1988. While the current Informix product line reflects a focus on database servers and tools (see Table 2, page 46), Informix has always encouraged a healthy applications market founded on the use of its tools and server engines. Whereas Oracle developed its own line of accounting and distribution applications, Informix left this to third parties. Both FourGen Software (Seattle, Wash.) and Concepts Dynamic (Schaumburg, Ill.), among others, have developed full accounting application suites based on the Informix RDBMS and built with Informix development tools.
The only time Informix diverted from its database-centric strategy was in 1988, when it merged with Innovative Software, adding the SmartWare desktop applications suite to its database-centric product line. This product acquisition, together with that of the Wingz graphical spreadsheet, followed a pattern similar to Novell's later acquisition of WordPerfect's desktop business. Both companies, Informix and Novell, moved into businesses that they did not understand and eventually divested the products they acquired. Also, just as the WordPerfect acquisition triggered the departure of Novell founder Ray Noorda, the SmartWare acquisition triggered the departure of Roger Sippl from Informix.
Both Informix and Novell subsequently refocused on their core businesses as a result of these forays into desktop applications. The current chairman, president, and CEO of Informix, Phillip E. White, joined the company in 1989. He took over in 1992 from Roger Sippl, who left to found Visigenic, a database access company focused on ODBC technology. White is credited with increasing shareholder value from 56 cents per share at the end of 1990 to $30 per share at the end of 1995. This performance placed Informix at the top of the Wall Street Journal's Shareholder Scoreboard for best five-year performer.
Without the opportunity to grow revenues through diversifying into applications or other non-database areas, Informix could face difficulties in sustaining its growth. Consequently, Informix is pursuing a number of strategies to strengthen and differentiate its core database products in order to reach new markets. These strategies include:
* increasing the range of data types that Informix RDBMS engines can handle
* establishing Informix engines as data warehousing platforms
* making Informix servers attractive for use in mobile computing
* taking advantage of the Internet to reach new database markets
* exploiting other emerging technologies, such as SmartCards
DSA is the marketing term for a database architecture designed to position Informix as a leading provider in the area of parallel processing and scalable database server technology. DSA provides a foundation for a range of high-end Informix database servers based on variants of the same core engine technology:
* The OnLine Extended Parallel Server is designed for very high-volume OLTP environments that need to utilize loosely coupled or shared-nothing computing architectures composed of clusters of symmetrical multiprocessing (SMP) or massively parallel processing (MPP) systems.
* The Online Dynamic Server is designed for high-volume OLTP environments that require replication, mainframe-level database administration tools, and the performance delivered by Informix's parallel data query technology (PDQ). PDQ enables parallel table scans, sorts, and joins, parallel query aggregation for decision support and parallel data loads, index builds, backups, and restores. Although this server supports SMP it does not support MPP, which is the essential differentiating feature between the OnLine Dynamic Server and the OnLine Extended Parallel Server.
* The OnLine Workgroup Server is designed for smaller numbers of user connections (up to 32 concurrent) and lower transaction volumes. It is also easier to administer because it offers less complex functionality compared to the higher-end servers.
These three server products position Informix to compete effectively against similar stratified server families from Oracle, IBM, and Sybase, as well as niche players such as Microsoft with its SQL Server product and Computer Associates with CA-OpenIngres. However, while IBM may lead with the exceptional database administration breadth and depth of its DB2 engine or Microsoft with the ease of use of its graphical administration tools, Informix is setting the pace in support for parallel processing that addresses an issue dear to every database users' heart, namely performance.
Informix has supported binary large object (BLOB) data for many years but the company recognizes that the need to store, and more important, to manipulate complex data other than text and numeric data, will be critical to its ability to address future customer needs. For this reason, Informix recently completed its acquisition of Illustra Information Technologies, founded by Ingres RDBMS designer Dr. Michael Stonebraker. Illustra specializes in handling image, 2D and 3D spatial data, time series, video, audio, and document data using snap-in modules called DataBlades that add object handling capabilities to an RDBMS via extensions to SQL. Informix has announced its intention to fully integrate Illustra technology into a new Informix-Universal Server product within the next year.
If Informix manages this task, and analysts such as Richard Finkelstein of Performance Computing doubt that it will (see Computerworld, February 12, 1996), Informix-Universal Server could put Informix in a unique position to service specialized and highly profitable markets such as:
* multimedia asset management for the entertainment industry
* electronic publishing and content management across the Internet
* risk management systems for financial services companies
* government and commercial geographic information systems (GISs)
Establishing an early leadership position in any one of these markets could easily account for another billion dollars in revenue for Informix. This would surely justify the time and cost required to rearchitect its core engine around the Illustra technology and position Informix as a player in the object/relational database market.
Delivery of the Informix-Universal Server is slated to take place in three phases:
1. delivery of a gateway to allow customers to access complex data stored in an Illustra Server and integrate it with traditional relational data in an Informix server (the second quarter of 1996)
2. delivery of a DataBlades Developer Tool Kit for creating new user-defined data types that work in both the Illustra Server and the new Informix-Universal Server (the second quarter of 1996)
3. delivery of the fully merged Informix-Universal Server technology including "snap in" DataBlades (the fourth quarter of 1996)
To some extent, you could argue that Informix (like competitors Oracle and Sybase) has surfed the technology wave of relational databases and Unix-based open systems that has swept across corporations over the last decade. Another more recent wave, data warehousing, is far from peaking, and Informix hedged its bets in this area with its acquisition of the San Francisco-based Stanford Technology Group (STG). STG is known for its MetaCube product, which presents a multidimensional view of underlying relational data through the use of an intermediary metadata layer. This lets users of Informix RDBMS servers carry out online analytical processing (OLAP) by using the MetaCube technology. Informix already has a major data warehouse implementation underway at the Consumer Market Division of communications giant MCI. This data warehouse is expected to grow from a 600GB data mart up to three terabytes.
Oracle and Sybase have also taken initiatives in this area and are integrating OLAP technology into their product lines to ensure that they lose as few possible sales to multidimensional server vendors such as Arbor Software (Sunnyvale, Calif.), which sells the Essbase Analysis Server, or to specialized data warehouse server vendors such as Red Brick Systems (Los Gatos, Calif.). The data warehousing wave provides database vendors the chance to offer an application that is no more than their current database engine and some combination of front-end query and reporting tools. The data warehouse solution from Informix also benefits from its built-in parallel processing functionality and log-based "continuous" data replication services for populating the data warehouse from other Informix servers. Leading U.K. database analysts Bloor Research Group cited Informix's DSA as "the best all-round parallel DBMS on the market" and claimed it "has significant benefits over almost all its competitors on data warehouse applications" ("Parallel Database Technology: An Evaluation and Comparison of Scalable Systems," Bloor Research Group, October 1995).
International Data Corp. forecasts suggest that shipments of laptop computers will grow from four million in 1995 to some eight million in 1999 in the U.S. alone. In other words, the road warrior population is set to at least double, and as more workers telecommute and the influence of the Internet makes itself felt in the business world, the term "office" will simply come to mean "where you are at this point in time." To support this scenario, Informix is working on its "anytime, anywhere" strategy, which sounds suspiciously similar to the concepts espoused by Sybase for its SQL Anywhere server product based on the recently acquired Watcom SQL engine.
However, the key to Informix's strategy for the mobile computing market is asynchronous messaging based on new middleware products being built by Informix that provide store-and-forward message delivery and the use of software agents to manage the process. Asynchronous messaging lets mobile clients send and receive messages without maintaining a constant connection with the server. Store-and-forward message delivery ensures that messages get sent or completed as soon as a connection is established or reestablished. The middleware and software agents are used to establish and maintain connections, to automate repetitive tasks, and to intelligently sort and save information. The applications that deliver this functionality can be created using the Informix class libraries built in the Informix NewEra tool, which allows for application partitioning to deploy components on mobile clients or servers.
NewEra is Informix's rapid application development tool that competes with Powersoft's (a Sybase company) PowerBuilder and Oracle's Developer 2000. Compared to its competitors, NewEra benefits from a strong object-oriented design that delivers a repository-based, class library-driven application development paradigm using class browsers for navigating application objects. NewEra can also generate cross-platform applications. Specifically, NewEra includes:
* a graphical window and form painter with a code generator
* a graphical front end for managing NewEra application components
* a graphical language editor for managing NewEra code
* an interactive, graphical debugger for analyzing NewEra programs
* repositories, class browsers, and configuration tools supporting team-based development
* reusable class libraries that can be Informix or third party provided or developer defined
The impending release of the latest version of NewEra, expected in the second quarter of 1996, is slated to deliver user-defined application partitioning for three-tier client/server deployment; OLE remote automation server support to allow OLE clients to make requests against NewEra built application servers; and class libraries to support transaction-processing monitors for load balancing of high volume OLTP applications. If this functionality is delivered as promised, then client/server application vendors such as Concepts Dynamic (Schaumburg, Ill.), whose Control suite of accounting applications is written in NewEra, will benefit from their use of Informix technology.
Informix, like everyone these days, is hot on the Web word. World Wide Web Interface Kits are available for use by Informix customers building Web applications using Informix-4GL or Informix-ESQL/C tools that need to use the common gateway interface (CGI) as a means to access Informix databases across the Internet. Informix has established a Web partner program to build links with other Web software developers such as Bluestone Inc.(Mountain View, Calif.) and Spider Technologies (Palo Alto, Calif.). Informix customers such as MCI, Choice Hotels, and the Internet Shopping Network are already forging ahead with Informix-based Web solutions. Illustra (now owned by Informix) also recently collaborated with other partners to deliver "24 Hours in Cyberspace." This event, claimed to be the largest online publishing event ever staged, allowed the organizers to create a new web page every 30 minutes comprising multimedia content delivered from hundreds of sites worldwide and stored in an Illustra DBMS.
Informix also partnered with Internet darling Netscape Communications Corp. to include the Informix-OnLine Workgroup Server RDBMS as the development and deployment database for Netscape's LiveWire Pro. The LiveWire Pro product is part of Netscape's SuiteSpot Web application development system for building online applications. This deal involves cross-licensing and selling of Informix and Netscape products and is likely to be among the first of many such collaborations between database and Internet vendors during 1996.
While the IPC vs. PC debate rages on in the press, let me put a spin on this scenario for you. You are a road warrior and before leaving on a trip you slip your personal profile SmartCard (PPS) into your jacket pocket and leave the laptop at home. Your PPS contains your personal login information and access numbers for Internet and Intranet connectivity. Eventually this PPS may also be software agent-trained to search for news on specific subjects, and may contain a couple of Java applets for corporate Intranet application front ends to submit your T&E (travel and entertainment) and review your departmental schedule. When you check into your room, there is an IPC designed specifically for OLIP (online Internet processing).
This IPC, which costs your hotel the same amount as the TV in your room, is a combined monitor, PPS reader, and keyboard/mouse already plumbed into the Internet. You switch on the IPC and with one swipe of your PPS in the reader you upload all your profile data into the IPC's local memory. While this is taking place, the hotel uses the opportunity to display its home page, welcoming you to the hotel, advertising goods and services, and, if you are a regular guest, showing you your current bill and your frequent guest program status. You then fire up your favorite browser to process some email, set your software agent off to collect the news, submit your trip expenses to the home office Intranet, and review your current schedule to book a few calls and juggle some appointments. All of this was done without a laptop or personal computer in sight and depends only on a simple device connected to the Internet and a SmartCard.
SmartCards are another technology on which Informix is working together with its partners, Hewlett-Packard (Palo Alto, Calif.) and GemPlus Card International Corp. (Gaithersburg, Md.). SmartCards will be used for all sorts of applications including buying, identifying, and securing things. It is not hard to see SmartCards being carried by everyone and combining your credit card, phone card, driver's license, and medical alert data onto one slim "plastic" database.
It's hard to see Informix taking a wrong step at the moment. The positioning of the Informix-Universal Server, the complementary strategies of mobile computing, Web-enabling, and SmartCards show some good, focused vision. Phillip White's record, as well as that of on-staff database gurus such as Dr. Michael Stonebraker of Ingres/Illustra fame and Mike Saranga of DB2 fame, all show the proven ability to execute these strategies successfully. Sounds like a recipe for success to me.
Year Ended Year Ended Percent Indicator 12/31/95 12/31/94 Growth Revenues $708,985,000 $468,697,000 51% Net Income $105,333,000 $66,196,000 59%
Category Product Description Database Servers INFORMIX-OnLine The Informix second generation OLTP Dynamic Server RDBMS engine offering parallel data processing and replication. Version 7.1 of the product runs on 11 symmetric multi-processing (SMP) platforms. INFORMIX-OnLine Extends the Dynamic Scalable Extended Parallel Architecture (DSA) server to run on Server (Online loosely coupled or shared-nothing XPS) computers, including SMP and massively parallel processor (MPP) systems. INFORMIX -OnLine The Informix first generation OLTP RDBMS supporting stored procedures, triggers, referential integrity and document imaging. INFORMIX-SE The Informix RDBMS designed for smaller organizations and offering easier installation and administration through a reduced functionality set. Application INFORMIX-NewEra A graphical, object oriented Development Tools development environment for creating client/server applications running on Microsoft Windows or OSF/Motif client GUIs. INFORMIX-4GL Character based application INFORMIX-SQL development environments. C-ISAM A library of C functions for managing indexed sequential access method files. INFORMIX-NewEra Viewpoint is a graphical data ViewPoint and access and query tool for use by ViewPoint Pro end users. ViewPoint Pro is a graphical database administration tool for use in managing the database schema and database views. Connectivity Various Informix offers connectivity tools Tools for connecting to IBM databases through DRDA,; for heterogeneous database access using Information Builders EDA-SQL; for cross server transaction processing; for moving processing from servers to clients; for OSF/DCE based connectivity; for multi-database transaction processing; for embedding SQL in C or COBOL programs