SAP swaps Oracle database for IBM

IBM and SAP strike a new alliance that is a blow to Oracle, which SAP used for years as its default database.

Jan. 2, 2002 4:43 p.m. PT

SAP, one of the world's largest enterprise software makers, and IBM today announced an agreement to expand their global sales, marketing and development relationship.

The companies said they plan to work together to provide more choices for customers who want to implement MySAP.com Internet business solutions and IBM's DB2 Universal Database on a variety of hardware platforms, including Windows 2000, Sun Microsystems, Linux, Windows NT and IBM's RS/6000, AS/400 and S/390 platforms.

Now, IBM joins Oracle as one of SAP's preferred suppliers--with SAP committing to using its DB2 database on IBM, Sun and Linux platforms for internal development and production systems within SAP.

"The combination of DB2 Universal Database and SAP solutions provides our customers with a competitive edge," Janet Perna, general manager of IBM Data Management Solutions, said in a statement.