Open Source Statistics
Diverse Benefits Drive Open Source Adoption
MySQL recently sponsored a survey among members of the Independent Oracle Users Group (IOUG) to measure the scope and adoption of open source software and solutions. One of the most interesting topics covered in the survey was the reasons driving open source adoption in the enterprise. While cost savings was by far the most popular reason cited by respondents (65%), other benefits included better performance and uptime (27%), the ability to rewrite or customize code (21%), and easier integration with current systems (18%). The survey also compared responses from small firms (fewer than 500 employees) to large firms (more than 5,000 employees) and found that small firms tend to favor benefits like maintenance support from the community, visibility into the roadmap and bugs, and better skills availability.
Survey Summary
Date: September 2007
Audience: Members of the IOUG. Job titles included database administrators, IT managers, directors, CIOs, and consultants. Respondents represented a wide range of organizations from many different industries ranging in size from 10,000 or more employees to fewer than 1,000 employees.
Number of Responses: 226
Source: Survey results are available through IOUG and MySQL (registration required)
Conclusion: Cost savings are clearly the biggest benefit driving open source adoption for both small and large organizations, but smaller firms are more likely to choose open source for a variety of additional reasons. As the survey notes, "smaller firms are somewhat more inclined to cite freedom from vendor lock-in (33% to 26%) and better performance (30% to 25%) as advantages." The survey concludes that small firms are "far more enamored with open source's provisioning of community support," while larger organizations tend to require commercial-grade support whether a software package is open source or proprietary.
Reasons for Open Source Implementations
|
Cost savings
|
67% |
|
No proprietary vendor lock-in
|
28% |
|
Better performance/uptime
|
27% |
| Ability to rewrite, customize, or adapt code |
21% |
| Don't know/unsure |
18% |
| Easier integration with current systems |
18% |
| Easier maintenance |
17% |
| Better skills availability |
15% |
| Visibility into roadmap, bugs, fixes |
9% |
| Competitive pressure |
9% |
| Other |
9% |
| To extend the life of hardware assets |
6% |
Leading Reasons for Open Source Implementations by Company Size
|
|
Small (<500 employees) |
Large (5,000+ employees) |
|
Cost savings
|
65% |
65% |
|
No proprietary vendor lock-in
|
33% |
26% |
| Better performance/uptime |
30% |
25% |
| Ability to rewrite, customize, or adapt code |
20% |
22% |
| Better skills availability |
23% |
7% |
| Easier maintenance |
26% |
12% |
| Visibility into roadmap, bugs, fixes |
17% |
6% |
Credits: IOUG and MySQL. The charts above were compiled from data referenced in the survey, "Open Source in the Enterprise: New Software Disrupts the Technology Stack."
