Sybase Bets on Java Technology

Stuart Lauchlan reports on the vendor?s efforts to gain ground at its international user group conference in Orlando

Sybase will move its entire product line to a Java-dependent database architecture over the next two years in an attempt to restore its tarnished technological reputation.

Revealed at the Sybase International User Group conference in Orlando, Florida, adaptive component architecture is a framework for extending the company?s SQL Server database to support data types and Java applications.

The architecture will be crucial to Sybase?s future ? the company lost ground in the market after a series of abortive development projects led it to report losses.

Sybase CEO Mitchell Kertzman said: ?A year ago it was reasonable to question our long-term viability. Today is the rebirth of Sybase. By the end of the month, it will be clear that Sybase will return to the number two position in the database market.?

Kertzman, who was appointed CEO nine months ago, said it had taken that time to sort out the company?s finances, organisation and product strategy.

?We did not want to make too many announcements until everything was in place. If it wasn?t there, anything we said would just have been marketing masturbation,? he said.

The first manifestation of the architecture will be in Adaptive Server 11.5, a renamed release of the existing SQL Server database planned to ship in six months. Adaptive Server Anywhere for mobile, embedded, and departmental computing will follow later this year, while an OLTP version called Adaptive Server Enterprise will ship in the second half of next year.