The expanding demand for Postgres across Europe prompted EnterpriseDB (EDB) to raise its profile. My joining EDB to lead the sales and partner development efforts in France was a part of EDB's expansion in Europe. On June 12, EDB rolled out an in-person initiative to introduce its Postgres Plus Advanced Server to prospective customers during a morning workshop in Paris. EDB put on the event with our French partner, THINK.
Marc Linster, EDB’s senior vice president of products and services, made the trip to Paris for the meeting. Linster introduced EDB to the audience and explained how the use of open source software and Postgres in particular was exploding worldwide. He went on to make the case for migrating from costly, traditional database solutions like Oracle and Microsoft.
“Nowadays, companies invest around 80% of their IT budget on maintenance and 20% on innovation. By migrating to Postgres, companies can redirect some of that 80% toward innovation and grow that number,” said Marc during his talk. “EDB’s Postgres Plus costs 80-90% less than comparable Oracle systems while supporting many of the workloads enterprises require. And because EDB’s Postgres Plus is compatible with Oracle, companies can preserve the investments they’ve made in tools and skills.”
PostgreSQL is very popular in France and the attendees were sophisticated users and knowledgeable about the performance, stability and quality of the software. Attendees represented a cross-section of French government agencies, top universities and operating companies. They understood the value and were very intrigued by the enhancements in Postgres Plus and EDB’s suite of tools.
Guillaume Petitfrere, CEO of THINK, attended and introduced his company while a THINK consultant presented a case study of a customer he helped over a period of 10 years, during which the customer migrated to PostgreSQL and then to EDB Postgres Plus.
It was a successful day for EDB and we left a lasting impression among the 45 attendees. EDB has officially begun to make its mark on the French marketplace.
Mathieu Le Faucheur is Sales Director, Southern Europe, at EDB.