Microsoft completes Datallegro purchase
The company says the data warehousing technology will enable it to offer SQL Server databases that can scale into the hundreds of terabytes of data.
Microsoft said on Tuesday that it has finalized its purchase of data warehousing specialist Datallegro.
The company also detailed its plans for the technology, saying that the purchase will pave the way for Microsoft to create "a new solution based on Datallegro's technology that extends Microsoft SQL Server to scale into hundreds of terabytes of data."
Doing that, though will take some time. The final version of that product is slated for the first half of 2010, though Microsoft said it will begin giving customers and partners access to early "community technology preview" releases within the next 12 months.
Microsoft announced its plans to buy Datallegro in July. Last month, Datallegro and its CEO, Stuart Frost, were hit with a patent infringement suit. Microsoft declined to comment at the time, but Frost said in a blog posting that "after analyzing the claims, we feel strongly that they're completely without merit and intend to vigorously defend our position." Frost also said that Datallegro was considering asking the patent office to re-examine the patent in question.
Update: A Microsoft representative said Tuesday that Microsoft will not sell Datallegro's products to new customers while it works on the combined effort, but said it will support current customers and that Microsoft plans to "upgrade them to the next release that will be integrated with the SQL Server product line."
I asked Microsoft for more details on why it will take two years to do a combined product, and was told by a representative that "We are not providing additional details on the product roadmap at this time, we will be sharing more information at the BI Conference Oct. 6-8."