When using an artifact that was relocated you need to exclude the one used directly, it doesn't work if you use the final relocated artifact. This is confusing when you get an artifact in your war but you need to exclude other. eg. if you don't use exclusions you get jdbc-stdext in the war. Using option b doesn't work, currently you need to use option a. <dependency> <artifactId>commons-dbcp</artifactId> <groupId>commons-dbcp</groupId> <version>1.2</version> <exclusions> <!-- option a --> <exclusion> <artifactId>jdbc</artifactId> <groupId>jdbc</groupId> </exclusion> <!-- option b --> <exclusion> <artifactId>jdbc-stdext</artifactId> <groupId>javax.sql</groupId> </exclusion> </exclusions> </dependency>