Open source database MariaDB secures €25m EIB funding

8 May 2017

The European Investment Bank. Image: Christian Mueller/Shutterstock

The European Investment Bank likes what it sees in MariaDB, putting €25m into the open source database for expected growth in the coming years.

The European Investment Bank’s (EIB) activities throughout the EU have proved quite interesting in recent years.

Originally set up through the Treaty of Rome in 1958, the EIB has become one of the world’s largest lenders, with a focus on sustainable initiatives tied to EU initiatives.

For example, earlier this year, it was involved in a double move in Wicklow, worth more than €200m to Ireland’s forestry infrastructure.

Last year, University College Cork signed a €100m loan agreement with the EIB to underpin a major expansion project.

And, as recently as last month, the lending institution signed an agreement worth €150m with the third-largest bank in the Netherlands, ABN Amro, to promote sustainable projects in the European maritime transport sector.

All significant sums, all relating to EU policy. So, when it puts €25m into a database, it’s worth taking a look.

MariaDB is behind one of the fastest-growing open source databases in the world. It is hoped that the funding will boost general global growth as well as initiate a push in Europe, which will see Helsinki benefit from new engineering roles.

“The investment from the EIB accelerates our ability to expand our product capabilities and continue to develop features that make MariaDB the easiest to use, the easiest to extend and the easiest to deploy in any environment,” said Michael Howard, CEO of MariaDB.

“This funding is part of a multi-step strategy to strengthen MariaDB across Europe, America and Asia, and will help foster the next phase of growth for the company.”

MariaDB is operating in a burgeoning industry. According to Gartner, by next year, more than 70pc of new in-house applications will be developed on an open source database.

Of the existing, commercial databases on the go, Gartner predicts that half will switch to open source in the near future.

The European Investment Bank. Image: Christian Mueller/Shutterstock

Gordon Hunt was a journalist with Silicon Republic

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