How do you solve a problem like MariaDB? Cozy up to the community, says new CEO

The new CEO of MariaDB (Plc) says he wants closer-knit collaboration with the foundation behind the eponymous open source database project. He cites the corporation’s newfound stability from its recent acquisition by a private equity firm as to why it should now be able to get on a firmer footing.

It has been a turbulent two years for MariaDB, with its ill-fated public listing via a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) in 2022 sending the company into a nosedive it never quite recovered from. Less than two years later, the Redwood City-based company was taken private by K1 Investment Management in a $37 million fire sale that was significantly below its opening day market cap of $368 million — which in turn was way below its peak private valuation of $672 million.

Last month’s transaction means that MariaDB’s shares are no longer trading on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), though the three-month de-registration process means that the company is still technically public through early December. However, with a new CEO already in place in the form of ex-Micro Focus executive Rohit De Souza (pictured above), MariaDB is already preparing for life as a private company once more — and this will involve getting cozier with the foundation that bears the same name.

“The [MariaDB’s] Foundation’s reason for existing in times past was there was a lot of uncertainty about MariaDB’s future,” De Souza told TechCrunch in an interview. “Today, with the backing of K1, there isn’t that uncertainty anymore.”

Ave MariaDB

The initial MariaDB project launched in 2009 as a response to MySQL falling under certain corporate ownership. MySQL is the popular open source relational database management system created by Michael “Monty” Widenius, David Axmark, and Allan Larsson back in the mid-’90s, who sold the commercial company behind the project to Sun Microsystems for $1 billion in 2008. A year later, Oracle announced it was acquiring Sun Microsystems for more than $7 billion, spurring Widenius to create MariaDB as a community-developed “fork” of MySQL.

In the wake of the deal, Widenius formed a couple of organizations, one called SkySQL (focused on MySQL services) and one called Monty Program (for MariaDB), which eventually merged and rebranded as MariaDB Corporation before going on to raise $230 million in funding to sell services around the MariaDB project.

In tandem, the MariaDB Foundation (established in 2012) has been safeguarding the “interests of MariaDB users and developers” as an independent not-for-profit.

Today, MariaDB is the 15th most popular database, according to DB-Engines Ranking, though that figure jumps to ninth for relational databases, and fourth for open source relational databases.

There have been tensions between the two MariaDB bodies through the years, particularly around the corporate entity’s focus on building out proprietary products and tools — which MariaDB Foundation CEO Kaj Arnö suggested has been to the detriment of the open source project. But after MariaDB appointed a new CEO and executive team last May, relations thawed, Arnö noting at the time that the Plc and the Foundation were “rebooting their entire relationship” with shared goals centered around cooperation and openness.

Twelve months on, and MariaDB has yet another new CEO. But an arguably more important factor is that it now has the backing of a major private equity firm, and it no longer has to pander to the pressures of the public markets. This could give MariaDB a little more freedom to get back to basics, in cahoots with the Foundation.

“There’s like a billion downloads [MariaDB database] and a big, vibrant community. Our intent is to grow that community, and have the Foundation be the engine that helps that community grow,” De Souza said. “We’ve got fairly deep pockets [now] — that doesn’t mean that we’re going to go out and spend like sailors tomorrow, but we can run a decent business together. A closer involvement with the Foundation will help feed things that the community really needs into product development — it will help us understand the community, and we could also use the community more to test new ideas.”

On the Foundation side, Arnö says that there are now “shared strategy sessions” taking place to find ways they can support each other’s efforts. He also echoed De Souza’s sentiments, adding that he doesn’t want to dwell too much on historical tensions.

“The past is behind us — I want to focus on the future, and how we can all work together on a shared goal, and not elaborate on the past,” Arnö told TechCrunch. “I am now more optimistic about the relationship between the Foundation and MariaDB the Company than I have ever been since taking the CEO position in 2019.”

Historically, the vast majority of the code for the core MariaDB Server product was provided by the MariaDB corporation, a reliance that led the Foundation to seek alternative sources. For example, last year it signed up Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its first “diamond” sponsor, which is committing €500,000 ($550,000) per year — more than any other sponsor. On top of that, the MariaDB Foundation is in the midst of bringing vector search (a major component of the AI revolution) to its main database, with Amazon one of the core contributors alongside the MariaDB corporation.

While the “relationship reboot” between the two MariaDBs is surely positive for those in the community, the Foundation is continuing to lean into its relationship with Amazon, which is now one of the single biggest code-contributing corporations outside of MariaDB Plc.

“AWS has recently stepped up to start contributing code for MariaDB Server,” Arnö said. “I find this to be exciting for a number of reasons, but in particular, of all the open source relational databases out there, AWS has specifically chosen to invest in MariaDB Server. MariaDB as part of AWS service offerings gives us great exposure to a large AWS user base, which feeds the overall community and collaboration we are trying to drive.”

Slim down, bulk up

Today, MariaDB Plc claims around 200 employees, 40% of whom reside in North America, while nearly half are located in Europe. That’s somewhat fewer than what it had at the start of last year, with the company going through two rounds of layoffs amounting to more than 100 staff — one-third of the workforce. In addition, part of this restructuring has entailed ditching key products “not related to the core MariaDB Enterprise Server business,” including its SkySQL cloud database service.

But despite all the cutbacks of the past 18 months, De Souza reckons that they’ll be more likely to see net growth in the coming months.

“There are always going to be places that we’ve over-invested in or under-invested in. There’s always going to be some fine-tuning, but I expect MariaDB to grow — I do expect to infuse new talent,” De Souza said. “I do expect to augment the existing talent. There’ll be some areas where we have to change things. Obviously, it hasn’t worked in the past for a reason.”

MariaDB grew off the back of more than $200 million in venture capital, and its failure in the public markets can be attributed to many things: the macroeconomic situation at the time, lukewarm financial performances, and the fact that it went public via the dubious SPAC route before it was close to profitable. Life as a private company, backed by private equity, couldn’t be more different — private equity is all about investing in underperforming businesses that have the potential to be stabilized and grow, and this usually starts with bringing in seasoned management.

De Souza has a strong record in the enterprise realm, having previously worked at Intel, SAP, Oracle, Hewlett Packard, and most recently Micro Focus, where he was a senior executive through its $6 billion acquisition by OpenText. He was also previously CEO and president of data management company Actian, which was acquired by HCL and private equity firm Sumeru Equity Partners in 2018.

And it’s this combination of experience and skills that De Souza sees as being one of the biggest assets that he brings to MariaDB.

“It’s everything from helping navigate customers, helping drive how products are developed, how you actually build a sales team,” De Souza said. “Every one of those is required to build an enterprise software company. But really, it’s all about people: understanding the people that you need inside the company, and how you stabilize and build those teams.”

While De Souza was hesitant to be drawn on the SPAC IPO debacle that his company endured before he joined, he did say that he was ultimately brought in to bring some “enterprise rigor” to the mix, now that it’s away from the pressures of being a public company.

“You’ve got to run a company efficiently, and at a profit — it doesn’t take a genius to run a company at a loss,” De Souza said. “That’s part of why I’m here, it’s to bring some enterprise rigor to the business — how we develop products, what we invest in, how we create some consistency and focus around the communities.”