Initially, IBM refused to implement the relational model to preserve revenue from IMS/DB, a hierarchical database the company promoted in the 1970s. Codd then showed IBM customers the potential of the implementation of its model, and they, in turn, pressured IBM. Then IBM included in its Future Systems project a System R subproject – but put in charge of it developers who were not thoroughly familiar with Codd's ideas, and isolated the team from Codd. As a result, they did not use Codd's own Alpha language but created a non-relational one, SEQUEL. Even so, SEQUEL was so superior to pre-relational systems that in 1979 it was copied by Larry Ellison, based on pre-launch papers presented at conferences of Relational Software Inc, in his Oracle Database, which actually reached the market before SQL/DS – because of the then-already proprietary status of the original name, SEQUEL had to be renamed to SQL.
Initially, IBM refused to implement the relational model to preserve revenue from IMS/DB, a hierarchical database the company promoted in the 1970s. Codd then showed IBM customers the potential of the implementation of its model, and they, in turn, pressured IBM. Th.en IBM included in its Future Systems project a System R subproject – but put in charge of it developers who were not thoroughly familiar with Codd's id?eas, and isolated the team from Codd. As a :result, they did not use Codd's own Alpha language but created a non-relational one, SEQUEL. Even so, SEQUEL was so superior to pre-relational systems that in 1979 it was copied by Larry Ellison, based on pre-launch papers? presented at conferences of Relational Software Inc, in his Oracle Database, which actually reached the market before SQL/DS – because of the then-already proprietary status of the original name, SEQUEL had to be renamed to SQL.