Large software vendors are prone to be outmaneuvered by their smaller and nimbler rivals at the start of new disruption cycles, but SAP SE hopes to avoid that fate with the latest iteration of its embedded database that debuted this week, which promises to address the rise of connected devices with new hardware-based optimization functionality.

The performance monitoring capability introduced in the update sizes up the processor on which the database is running and determines the best balance of speed and efficiency for that particular operating environment. Administrators can make further tweaks through a backend console added in conjuction based on their specific requirements.

That empowers organizations to use the database across a broad range of devices without having to apply any major modifications to their implementations, which checks two major items off SAP’s competitive to-do list. The first and arguably most significant is making the traditionally mobile-oriented SQL Anywhere relatively portable onto the new categories of connected objects finding their way into the corporate network.

That extends the usefulness of the system to several billion more devices while simultaneously addressing the company’s other top-priority in the embedded database market: fending off its fast-growing open-source competitors back in the mobile arena.

Traditional nemesis SQLite has recently been joined by a project called Realm that saw its install base balloon to a whopping 100 smartphones and tablets over the last year or so thanks to a combination of highly competitive performance and a ease-of-use. SAP hopes that providing customers with the ability to use SQL Anywhere for both their mobile and connected device projects will help offset that value proposition.

That should prove especially appealing to organizations that are already using the database and have all the associated licensing, support and training commitments in place. Just to cement the pitch, the new version of SQL Anywhere also adds encryption to protect data flowing connected devices at the edge of the network to an organization’s backend systems.

Given that the release appears to be geared primarily towards existing customers, the backend systems that SAP has in mind are probably its own, most notably HANA. That’s made clear by the fact that SQL Anywhere boasts improved integration with the in-memory database on top of the other features introduced in the new iteration, which represents another potential advantage over the likes of Realm.

Photo via Kostant Infosolutions