How Alibaba’s “De‑IOE” Journey Turned OceanBase into a World‑Class Database

In September 2009 the author was tasked with establishing Taobao’s Technical Support Department and soon launched the 2010 technology budget, famously telling chief architect Wang Jian that “Taobao will not purchase minicomputers in 2010,” which sparked a decisive push for the “de‑IOE” (remove IOE) initiative.

In May 2010 Zhengxiang joined Taobao, marking the start of OceanBase’s independent development, which endured years of opposition and hardship before achieving a legendary status.

In October 2019 OceanBase topped the TPC‑C benchmark worldwide, demonstrating that Alibaba’s digital economy has solved one of China’s long‑standing IT soft spots—the database challenge—by delivering a 100 % self‑developed, secure, and controllable system.

The “de‑IOE” project delivers three strategic benefits:

Flexible architecture that supports rapid business growth

Accumulation of foundational engineering technology and talent

Significant cost reduction

Key milestones of the “de‑IOE” effort include:

2009‑11 – Wang Jian initiates Alibaba’s “de‑IOE” project

2010‑01 – Core Taobao systems begin “de‑IOE” work

2010‑05 – Zhengxiang joins Taobao; OceanBase project launched

2010‑07 – Commodity database “de‑I” completed

2011‑07 – Commodity database “de‑OE” completed

2011‑09 – Transaction database “de‑IOE” completed

2011‑11 – OceanBase supports Double 11, serving Taobao favorites

2012‑06 – B2B/Alibaba Finance starts “de‑IOE”

2012‑11 – OceanBase moves to Alipay

2012‑12 – Large‑scale Taobao “de‑IOE” completed

2013‑04 – CBU/ICBU completes “de‑I”

2013‑05 – Alipay completes “de‑IE”

2013‑06 – Alibaba Mama completes “de‑O”

2014‑11 – OceanBase handles 10 % of Alipay transaction traffic

2015‑11 – OceanBase handles 100 % of Alipay transactions and 50 % of payments

2016‑11 – OceanBase handles 100 % of Alipay transactions, payments, and 30 % of Huabei accounting

2017‑11 – OceanBase handles 100 % of Alipay transactions, payments, and accounting, and expands to Nanjing Bank’s core system

2018‑09 – OceanBase 2.0 announced at Cloud Ridge Conference, compatible with Oracle

2019‑10 – OceanBase 2.2 (Oracle‑compatible) released, TPC‑C results announced

These achievements illustrate how a decade‑long “de‑IOE” effort transformed a home‑grown database into a world‑leading, cost‑effective, and high‑performance solution.