American-based software company
Versant Corporation
was an American-based software company building specialized
NoSQL
data management systems. Versant was founded in
Menlo Park, California
(USA) in 1988. It was headquartered in
Redwood City, California
.
It was noted in 2005 that the market share for object oriented databases held by Versant was "very small" compared to IBM and Oracle.
[2]
However, two years earlier, Versant ODBMS and
IBM UniData
were mentioned side-by-side as "two of the most recent examples of object-oriented database software" in a bestselling database design text.
[3]
History
[
edit
]
The company was founded by Dr. Kee Ong in August 1988 as "Object Sciences Corporation". Ong previously worked with the open-source relational database management system
Ingres
. Around this time
object-oriented programming
(OO) became popular, and the company used research done at the
University of Wisconsin
[4]
for a commercial database system to complement OO languages. The company's initial executive team included Michael Seashols (CEO), Dr. Kee Ong (CTO), John Hughes (VP, Sales), Dr. Mary Loomis (VP, Services) and Susan Dickerson (VP, Business Development).
In early 1990 the company was renamed “Versant Object Technology.” In April 1993 David Banks took over as CEO.
[5]
On July 18, 1996 Versant had their
initial public offering
(IPO) on the
NASDAQ
stock exchange and traded under the symbol VSNT.
[6]
The company raised $14.9 million from the IPO, and was based in
Menlo Park, California
at the time, but moved to
Fremont, California
in 1997.
[6]
In January 1998 Nick Ordon succeeded Banks as CEO.
[7]
on July 15, 1998 the company was renamed again to Versant Corporation.
[8]
In the 1990s, Versant went through a period where most of their R&D costs were spent on "maintaining and upgrading existing product releases" across a LARGE number of operating systems and hardware. According to a former VP of engineering,
outsourcing
this maintenance grind of R&D maintenance to India was the main action that allowed the company to survive the decade.
[9]
In March 2004, Versant acquired Poet Software GmbH, a European-focused company targeting the Windows product market which had traded on the
Frankfurt Stock Exchange
. In 2005, Jochen Witte, president of Poet Software, took over as CEO of Versant Corporation. In August 2005, the common stock had a 1-for-10
reverse stock split
. On December 1, 2008 Versant acquired the assets of the database software business of Servo Software, Inc. (formerly named db4objects, Inc.). It developed the open source embedded database technology
db4o
.
[1]
[8]
The original implementation of Versant was targeted at
C
,
C++
and
Smalltalk
users. In 1995 Versant introduced support for the
Java programming language
and then in 2009 for
C#
and the
.NET
platform. In 2012 Versant introduced Versant JPA, a
Java Persistence API
2.0 compliant interface for its object database, with a technical preview of an
analytics
product including
Apache Hadoop
support.
In late 2012, after rejecting an offer by
UNICOM Systems
Inc., Versant Corporation announced it was being acquired by
Actian Corporation
, the commercial developer of
Ingres
and
Vectorwise
. The acquisition was promoted using the marketing term
big data
.
[10]
It closed in December for an estimated $37 million.
[11]
Products
[
edit
]
Versant Object Database was renamed
Actian NoSQL Database
and it's currently used as the metadata store for Avalanche, Actian's cloud data warehouse offering based on VectorH, an MPP version of Vector (formerly known as Vectorwise).
Other than Versant Object Database, Versant marketed two other commercial
object-oriented database management systems
(OODBMS), Versant JPA and Versant FastObjects, and the open-source database
db4o
.
- Versant JPA (now NoSQL JPA) is a JPA 2.0 compliant interface for its object database that includes a technical preview of an analytics platform including Hadoop support.
[12]
It is available as a server and SDK for use with
Windows
and
Linux
operating systems.
- Versant FastObjects (now NoSQL FastObjects) is a developer-friendly, object-oriented alternative to a relational database for .NET persistence.
[13]
- db4o
was an embeddable open-source object database for Java and .NET. db4o was coded in Java and translated to C# by an open-source tool called Sharpen.
[14]
It was discontinued by Actian in 2014.
Features comparison
|
NoSQL Database
|
NoSQL JPA
|
NoSQL Fast Objects
|
C/C++
|
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
Java
|
No
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
.NET
|
No
|
No
|
Yes
|
Enterprise scalability
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Embeddable
|
No
|
No
|
Yes
|
Minimal administration ? no specialized DBA required
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Dual client/server caching architecture ? improve performance by balancing resources
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Multicore scalability ? get the most value from your hardware
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
No mapping code required ? focus on the business problem
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Online schema evolution ? update your application without downtime
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
The company also developed a product called "enJin", an infrastructure platform to work with other systems as a "transaction accelerator" by supporting decoupling between
J2EE applications
and data stores which worked as a type of
middleware
object cache. IBM suggested the use of Versant enJin as an accelerator in the context of
IBM WebSphere
applications, which themselves were middleware applications.
[15]
: 3
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
"Revenues of $6.0 million for Q4 2008 / Versant acquires db4objects' database business / Share repurchase program announced"
.
Press release
. December 4, 2008. Archived from
the original
on December 21, 2008
. Retrieved
December 8,
2013
.
- ^
Fromming R, Rausch A (2005). "Chapter V. Migration of Persistent Object Models Using XMI". In Yang H (ed.).
Advances in UML and XML-Based Software Evolution
. Idea Group Publishing. p. 103.
ISBN
1-59140-621-8
. Retrieved
July 2,
2023
– via Internet Archive.
- ^
Hernandez, Michael J. (2003). "Chapter 1 The Relational Database (Beyond the Relational Model)".
Database Design for Mere Mortals
(2nd ed.). Addison-Wesley. p. 21.
ISBN
0201752840
– via Internet Archive.
- ^
Chou, H.T.;
Dewitt, David J.
;
Katz, Randy H.
; Klug, Anthony C. (October 1985).
"Design and implementation of the wisconsin storage system"
.
Software: Practice and Experience
.
15
(10): 943?962.
doi
:
10.1002/spe.4380151003
.
S2CID
40376932
.
- ^
Versant Object Technology (April 30, 1997).
"Proxy Statement"
.
Schedule 14A
. US Securities and Exchange Commission
. Retrieved
December 4,
2013
.
- ^
a
b
Versant Object Technology (March 28, 1997).
"Annual Report for the fiscal year ending December 31, 1996"
.
Form 10-KSB
. US Securities and Exchange Commission
. Retrieved
December 4,
2013
.
- ^
Versant Object Technology (April 30, 1998).
"Proxy Statement"
.
Schedule 14A
. US Securities and Exchange Commission
. Retrieved
December 4,
2013
.
- ^
a
b
Versant Corporation (January 14, 2009).
"Annual Report for the fiscal year ended October 31, 2008"
.
Form 10-K
. US Securities and Exchange Commission
. Retrieved
December 4,
2013
.
- ^
Levy, Mitchell (2005). "Some ROI Stories (Case Study: Versant)".
Happy about Outsourcing
. California, United States: HappyAbout.info. pp. 26?27.
ISBN
9780963330222
. Retrieved
July 2,
2023
– via Internet Archive.
- ^
"Giving Thanks for Versant and Actian"
.
Blog
. Enterprise Strategy Group. November 26, 2012
. Retrieved
December 3,
2013
.
- ^
Doug Henschen (February 1, 2013).
"Actian Builds Mini Big Data Empire"
.
Information Week
. Retrieved
December 3,
2013
.
- ^
[3] “
New Versant JPA Delivers Multiple NoSQL Analytics
,” Dr. Dobb’s Journal. October 28, 2012.
- ^
[5] “
FastObjects Tutorial
,” YouTube. January 9, 2012.
- ^
[6] Db4o website
[1]
Archived
2012-12-27 at the
Wayback Machine
- ^
Chhabria, Sanjiv (2002).
Accelerating IBM WebSphere Application Server Performance with Versant enJin
. IBM International Technical Support Organization – via Internet Archive.