MaxDB is an ANSI SQL-92 (entry level) compliant relational
database management system (RDBMS) from SAP AG, that is delivered
by MySQL AB as well. MaxDB fulfills the needs for enterprise
usage: safety, scalability, high concurrency, and performance. It
runs on all major operating systems. Over the years it has proven
able to run SAP R/3 and terabytes of data in 24×7 operation.
The database development started in 1977 as a research project at
the Technical University of Berlin. In the early 1980s it became a
database product that subsequently was owned by Nixdorf, Siemens
Nixdorf, Software AG, and today by SAP AG. Along the way, it has
been named VDN, Reflex, Supra 2, DDB/4, Entire SQL-DB-Server, and
ADABAS D. In 1997, SAP took over the software from Software AG and
renamed it to SAP DB. Since October 2000, SAP DB sources
additionally were released as Open Source under the GNU General
Public License (see Appendix J, GNU General Public License).
In 2003, SAP AG and MySQL AB formed a partnership and re-branded
the database system to MaxDB.
