FROM WIKIPEDIA: MySQL (pronounced my see kul) is a multithreaded, multi-user SQL database management system (DBMS)[1] which has, according to MySQL AB, more than 10 million installations.
MySQL is owned and sponsored by a single for-profit firm, the Swedish company MySQL AB, which holds the copyright to most of the codebase. This is similar to the JBoss model and how the Free Software Foundation handles copyright in its projects, and dissimilar to how the Apache project does it, where the software is developed by a public community and the copyright to the codebase is owned by its individual authors.
The company develops and maintains the system, selling support and service contracts, as well as proprietary-licensed copies of MySQL, and employing people all over the world who collaborate via the Internet. MySQL AB was founded by David Axmark, Allan Larsson, and Michael "Monty" Widenius. The CEO is Mårten Mickos.
The MySQL company also sells another DBMS, MaxDB, which is from an unrelated codebase.MySql Notes
