UKOUG pleased to with Oracle’s Sun acquisition

Ronan Miles, chairman of UKOUG, says: "We are pleased, after this long period, that the ruling was the right one for our members." Miles says that the majority of the 1,500-plus Oracle customers represented by UKOUG wanted the merger to go ahead. "It is evidence of our credibility within Oracle, that we were asked to present our independent position to the EU, and that this support is seen as a key contributor to the eventual decision," he adds. Miles says that UKOUG "fully understand the degree of concern this will bring to users of the acquired products", but counters: "It is now our job to represent those concerns and ensure that these new communities can benefit as much as possible from the acquisition." Oracle's Sun acquisition was in jeopardy after European antitrust officials expressed concerns over competition in the database market – in particular the direct competition between Sun's MySQL and Oracle's own rival software.