Oracle learns to tango with transactions

Software giant Oracle has made yet another acquisition, announcing last week it is buying data grid software firm Tangosol to improve its transaction processing.

The deal comes just weeks after Oracle snapped up performance management software vendor Hyperion for US$3.3 billion. The financial details of the Tangosol deal were not disclosed.

Data grid software is middleware that manages data objects in-memory across multiple servers. It is used to raise application performance by enabling fast access to frequently used data, removing the need to access it from slower moving back-end systems.

The vendor described Tangosol's flagship product, Coherence Data Grid, as a fundamental enabler for the rapidly growing space of extreme transaction processing (ETP) - used in sectors such as financial services, telecommunications and logistics.

Tangosol claims to have more than 1,500 customer implementations worldwide.

Oracle said that coupled with its Fusion Middleware, TimesTen and Database, Tangosol's technology would provide an integrated platform for businesses moving to the ETP model of transaction processing.