A survey by Java platform company Azul has found that about 72% of Oracle Java respondents may consider jumping ship to open source alternatives such as OpenJDK.
The Java platform specialist asked about 2000 Java users about Java adoption trends, migration of Java apps to the cloud, cloud cost optimisation, security considerations and Oracle Java licensing changes in its State of Java Survey and Report.
About 82% indicated concern about the January 2023 shift to Java SE Universal subscription pricing, the fourth “major” change to licensing and policy by the vendor in four years.
“The cost of Oracle Java changed from being based on the number of processors used by Java applications to the total number of employees and contractors in the organisation.
“More than seven in ten (72%) respondents said they were considering open source alternatives such OpenJDK. Of those who were not, 14% said it didn’t occur to them that they could [change],” according to the related announcement.
Scott Sellers, co-founder and chief executive at Azul, said: “High-performance Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) are playing a pivotal role in meeting application service levels and cloud cost optimisation. The choices businesses make around Java directly impact their operational efficiency and the bottom line.”
However, the concerns raised over Oracle’s latest Java licensing and pricing changes had also highlighted a “need for stability and trust” – which was something that Azul wanted to fulfil, he said.
Ninety-eight percent of respondents indicated using Java in their software applications or infrastructure.
Some 57% said Java was the backbone of most of their organisation’s applications.
“When including Java-based frameworks, libraries and other languages that use the JVM, the data shows that Java continues to play a fundamental role,” according to the announcement.
Forty-two percent of respondents indicated use of at least one instance of Oracle Java, but 74% of that sample said they also use at least one OpenJDK provider.
About 60% of companies have chosen an OpenJDK distribution over Oracle Java SE, according to Azul.
Nine in ten respondents use Java in a cloud environment.
“In a tell-tale sign of over-provisioning cloud resources, nearly 70% of companies say they are paying for cloud capacity that they are not using,” the vendor added.
A high-performance Java platform can help organisations use cloud resources more efficiently, it added.
Jevin Jensen, research vice president of intelligent cloud ops at global market analysis firm IDC, agreed.
“Enterprises often don’t use all the cloud computing they pay for due to the over-provisioning of virtual servers, required to accommodate spikes in demand from ultra high-performing applications and where end-user experience is paramount,” Jensen was quoted as saying in the Azul announcement.
“Running Java applications and infrastructure with a faster and more efficient JVM can provide superior performance, consistency, and the capacity to address these challenges.”
