AcuStaf Software and Exadel Offer Ingres Database as Part of a Cloud Solution Stack

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Ingres and its partners are making application development in the cloud a whole lot easier and cost effective. Ingres Corporation, the leading open source database management company and pioneer of the New Economics of IT, announced today that Ingres Database is a key component in innovative cloud solutions offered by two of its leading partners. AcuStaf Software, provider of a web-based automated scheduling, staffing, and labor management system, and Exadel, a leading provider of innovative Web 2.0 professional services and application development software, have taken Ingres Database into the cloud as part of their open source development stack offerings.

“Now, more than ever, companies are looking to the cloud to achieve real cost savings. Exadel is well positioned to help companies move their development and production environments of RIA and mission critical applications to the cloud and we are pleased that Ingres had joined us there.”

“The superior economics and accelerated innovation of the open source model are widely recognized as essential to successful cloud and SaaS initiatives,” said Roger Burkhardt, CEO, Ingres. “Ingres Database has been widely recognized as being unique in providing the necessary enterprise class attributes such as security and reliability in the open source database space, and we have recently invested in massive scale out and automation technologies to support our partners and customers move into the cloud.”

“Our latest cloud initiatives are designed to give our customers more choices, partners more flexibility, and to remind our development community that we fully support their use of open source in the cloud,” continued Burkhardt. “The economics and elasticity of cloud, SaaS, and open source computing are bar none and we’re committed to all three models. It’s the perfect storm for modern application deployment. Given the subscription nature we can all now work together to eliminate the type of large, upfront spending projects that have typified IT in the past and leverage utility based pricing that the cloud offers. Any model that doesn’t let you spend less when you need less – and vice versa – is broken.“

Ingres Database Key to AcuStaf’s SaaS Schedule Staffing and Labor Management Cloud Offering

AcuStaf is a web-based automated scheduling, staffing, and labor management system. AcuStaf currently offers a turnkey cloud solution using Amazon Web Services and Ingres Database.

“Initiating a new server used to take 2 to 3 days. This process now takes just 30 minutes using cloud technology,” said Terry Suby, CEO, AcuStaf Software. “Ingres Database fits into our cloud strategy because it is reliable, scales quickly, and is open source. If it wasn’t open source, we would need to buy all kinds of expensive database licenses and be held hostage to the database vendors. I don’t know of a better database than Ingres for the cloud.”

Ingres Database powers two critical applications for AcuStaf – Schedule Staffing and Labor Management. Schedule Staffing offers a real time solution for schedule development, shift staffing, and credential tracking. Labor Management incorporates all Schedule Staffing features with Time & Attendance and automatic Pay Edit rules to offer real time enterprise wide payroll accurate information. AcuStaf customers realize significant cost reductions in process automation, overtime and staffing cost reductions, and improved service outcomes. AcuStaf is an integrated enterprise solution that serves organizations from 100 employees to over 35,000.

Ingres Database Integral Part of Exadel’s Cloud in a Box

Developers and ISVs can use open source and the cloud to write java applications as a way to drive down deployment costs. Exadel is the leading provider of innovative Web 2.0 application software and professional services that help organizations deploy the rich Internet applications they need to claim leadership in their markets. Ingres Database is part of Exadel’s Cloud in a Box, a readymade stack that runs in the cloud or on an organization's own hardware to develop rich internet applications with complete flexibility. Exadel’s Cloud in a Box is a free, fully functioning open source web services stack that includes Ingres Database, Fedora, RichFaces, Eclipse, JBoss, Apache, and a RichFaces demo.

“Ingres Database is a critical piece of our Cloud in a Box offering,” said Fima Katz, CEO, Exadel. “Now, more than ever, companies are looking to the cloud to achieve real cost savings. Exadel is well positioned to help companies move their development and production environments of RIA and mission critical applications to the cloud and we are pleased that Ingres had joined us there.”

“Kettle River was able to deploy an Ingres web application into Exadel’s pre-packaged cloud environment in less than an hour,” said Michael Leo, director, managed services, Kettle River Consulting. “Setup was flawless and the Java environment more than met our expectations, but it was the speed that really impressed us. We were amazed at how fast we could create either development or deployment of a production application in the cloud. Exadel really thought this through and Ingres Database fits in nicely in the stack. We will definitely encourage our Ingres clients to deploy new or existing applications to take advantage of cloud computing when it makes sense for them.”

Cloud Adoption Taking Off

Cloud computing is maturing at a rapid pace. The industry is at the cusp of a transition to more widespread adoption by pragmatists who view this as the most cost-effective alternative for them. Open source underpins many of the leading current implementations because it allows for faster innovation and superior economics. Ingres is uniquely positioned to help open source move up in the stack of cloud applications to include databases.

“Adoption of the cloud will accelerate in 2010, with small businesses and enterprises in developing nations taking great advantage of cloud-based services,” states Gartner in its “Hype Cycle for Cloud Computing 2009,” and published in July 2009. “Cloud Computing can have significant business impact on an enterprise, including reduced total cost of ownership (TCO), accelerated time to market, and reduced requirements for real estate, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC), and support personnel.”

The Gartner report also states, “As cloud infrastructure with DBMSs gains maturity, especially in scalability, reliability and security, cloud implementations used for short-term projects, small departmental applications and rapid development platforms will show marked cost reductions compared with implementations within the IT department. The speed of setup will be a primary driver to rapid deployment of systems without the requirements and planning necessary for IT projects within the IT department. This will also reduce the necessity of IT to be able to respond to short notice and short duration projects, reducing overall costs in IT.”

Ingres in the Cloud

Ingres is the world’s second largest independent open source company and has been working in the cloud for years. Ingres software engineers/developers and community developers have already been working long-term with others that use open source code in the creation of business applications that run on enterprise-based clouds, both on-premise and public.

“It’s not exactly a brand new concept – it’s just one that’s really blown up over the last few years,” said Bill Maimone, senior vice president of engineering, Ingres. “The online computing, or cloud revolution really started a long time ago in various formats but in today’s incarnation it started near the turn of the century with a number of small companies that first created the model of delivering shareable business applications in a single data center.”

For more information on Ingres in the cloud, please go to www.ingres.com/solutions/cloud/.