SAP AG's Business Objects, the world's largest maker of software to track corporate databases, is gaining market share after its biggest publicly traded rivals were bought, unit Chief Executive Officer John Schwarz said.

Cognos Inc may have lost momentum after being bought by IBM, Schwarz told Bloomberg News. Oracle scrapped products at Hyperion Solutions Corp after buying the company in April 2007, resulting in customer losses, he said.

"We're gaining market share dramatically," said Schwarz. "Cognos and Hyperion lost share after their acquisition."

SAP completed its 3.7 billion-euro (US$5.41 billion) takeover of Business Objects in February. Schwarz said Business Objects' market share gains have accelerated to a rate of more than 1 percentage point a year since being acquired.

The global business-intelligence software market was worth about US$5.1 billion in 2007, according to market researcher Gartner Inc. Business Objects and SAP had a combined market share of about 26 percent, compared with 15 percent for Cognos and IBM and 11 percent for Hyperion, Gartner said.

"For Hyperion it's pretty clear: Oracle deleted more than half of the portfolio," Schwarz said.

"At Cognos it's probably inertia, loss of momentum because of the integration. We made a real impact for SAP. Cognos doesn't move the needle for IBM."