Company : Customers : DBBalance

DBBalance

Goal:

Make cross database comparison, synchronization and migration easier by allowing immediate, seamless and intuitive database access in a diverse database environment. Taking the pain out of working with multiple databases and vendors and provide immediate ROI.

Why they selected DataDirect:

DataDirect offers the latest and most comprehensive connectivity support for a wide variety of databases, with superior performance in all cases.

Business Benefits:

Satisfied customers increase return and retention rates. Reduced likelihood for problems cuts support calls

Technical Benefits:

Embedding proven data connectivity drivers ensures top-notch connectivity out of the box to any commonly-used databases.

Technical Details:

"Completion of features was our primary criterion," says Frid. "The rapidity which DataDirect ports all the latest features of a wide variety of databases pretty much decided us. Then when we saw the superior performance, that put the seal on the deal."

Giving Customers Instant Benefits

DBBalance faced a real challenge: many of its customers were experiencing difficulties getting their products to work. This might be troublesome for any software company, but for DBBalance it was particularly bad. Ease of use is the very essence of what the company provides.

"What we repeatedly hear from our customers is 'boy, you guys really take the pain out of working with different types of databases,' says Ina Frid, Director of Marketing at DBBalance.

Founded in 2006, DBBalance provides solutions for cross-database comparison, synchronization, migration, and conversion. It serves major diverse customers that include a some of the largest banks and trusts in the financial sector, leading insurance companies, government, military and leading utility authorities, leading cellular phone providers, and many other customers in sectors such as software, education, healthcare, and communications DBBalance's unique solutions enable these customers to work with any multiple ODBC-enabled databases. The company's software essentially takes complex tasks — its comprehensive operations take account of not just data, but structure, formats, and specific database features — and greatly simplifies it for the end user.

"We make things really, really easy," Frid explains. "For example, using our software you can point at one database, then point at another, and specify that you want them to look the same. The software does all the rest."

So when many customers reported technical difficulties, it threatened one of the core value propositions that attracts customers to the product to begin with.

The problem, however, had nothing at all to do with the DBBalance solution suite. It had to do with the ODBC drivers or lack of drivers used to establish connectivity to the customers' databases with the DBBalance product in use. Such drivers were a prerequisite for use of the solutions. While such drivers are ordinarily included in commercial databases specifically to allow connection by third-party products, customers tended to require technical assistance in identifying the drivers they had, and often lacked the proper drivers to be used.

To make matters worse, often the drivers that worked did so with less than adequate results. Either their performance was unacceptable, or they prevented the DBBalance technology from taking advantage of all the features offered by the database vendor. The company's technology goes far beyond straightforward comparison, synchronization, migration, or conversion. The software's awareness of the intricacies of different databases —data types, table and view structure, indexes, column properties, keys, etc. — including a comprehensive set of defaults that enable immediate benefits as well as a wide range of user-defined variables in exactly how those operations are carried out.

"Our software provides our users with options to apply specific requirements," says Frid. "They can, for example, change the data when moving from one type of database to another, tweak it to a specified range of tolerances for comparison, or synchronize only a specific portion of a database — say, a particular table or even a single column."

There is a wide variety and combinations of databases with which customer might use DBBalance software; it supports most widely used databases including Oracle, DB2, Sybase, Microsoft SQL Server and Access, and a host of others. Considering that different versions of each database use different connectivity drivers, the likelihood was high that whatever drivers a customer had — provided it worked at all — would be less than optimal.

DBBalance determined to find a third-party data connectivity provider whose software could be embedded in the DBBalance products and allow customers to immediately start using them out of the box. Their wish list was short but non-negotiable:

• The connectivity solution had to provide connectivity to a very extensive variety of databases commonly used in a typical organization.
• It had to support the latest versions and feature sets of whatever databases a customer might choose to use.
• It had to demonstrate adequate performance in every case.

DBBalance staff members began asking questions of their colleagues in IT, which is where they first heard of DataDirect.

"We were basically told, 'if you guys want productivity with different databases, you should probably go with DataDirect,'" Frid recalls.

A two-month evaluation of DataDirect and some other solutions convinced DBBalance that DataDirect did indeed fit the bill exactly.

"Completion of features was our primary criterion," says Frid. "The rapidity which DataDirect ports all the latest features of a wide variety of databases pretty much decided us. Then when we saw the superior performance, that put the seal on the deal."

Frid reports that integrating DataDirect's product with their own was a simple matter.

"In order to have our solution deliver superior performance and the features our customers expect, we needed to partner with somebody who could give us the right mix," she says in conclusion. "DataDirect's software makes it easier for our customers to immediately benefit from our products. I'd absolutely recommend it."