TPM about the Mysql AB deal

TPM wrote a really positive comment about the acquisition of Mysql AB by Sun:

This is arguably one of the smartest moves Sun has made in a decade, and probably rivals the decision it made in the mid-1990s to buy the carcasses from Thinking Machines, Kendall Square, and the Cray Sparc-based server business.

He compares the deal with the most important deal for Sun so far, the acquisition of Cray Business Systems Division. Cray developed a 64 processor system, the Cray CS6400, at that time based on the SuperSPARC architecture. SGI bought Cray in 1996 but didn´t want an additional processor architecture in their portfolio. Thus the Business Systems Division was sold to Sun. The successor of the CS6400 was based on the UltraSPARC architecture and had the internal code name Starfire. The official name of this system was Sun Enterprise 10000. This system was really important to build up our reputation in the datacenter. The deal with Mysql AB has similar potential. At least when you combine the ubiquitousness of Mysql and Suns reputation into considereration. You won´t get an die-hard mainframe user to mysql, but more people will think twice before using a large wad of cash for buying a proprietary database.