Open Source News

What's Next for Novell?

By Paula Bernier, Executive Editor, IP Communications Magazines  |  November 01, 2010

This article originally appeared in the November 2010 issue of INTERNET TELEPHONY

As of press time in late September, rumors were swirling about the potential acquisition of Novell (News - Alert) Inc., one of the large companies that contributes to and distributes products and services supporting the popular open source technology known as Linux. Most reports indicated that VMware Inc. is the most likely company to take control of Novell. The Wall Street Journal in September also suggested that Attachmate Corp., a private-equity backed software company, may be interested in some of the Novell assets, including NetWare, Novell's network operating system. And that spurred reports that a two-part deal with Novell could be at hand.

VMware already clearly has an interest in Novell, as the two companies announced an expanded partnership in June. Then, at VMworld 2010 in early September, VMware and Novell announced the general availability of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for VMware, as the first step in that partnership. 

With SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for VMware, customers who purchase a VMware vSphere license and subscription also receive a subscription for patches and updates to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for VMware at no additional cost. And VMware offers customers the option to purchase technical support services for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for Vmware. The idea here is to reduce the cost and complexity of deploying and maintaining an enterprise operating system running on VMware vSphere.

 Joe Wagner, senior vice president and general manager for global alliances at Novell, says that “SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for VMware is the logical choice for VMware customers deploying and managing Linux within their enterprise. This agreement is also a strong validation of Novell's strategy to lead in the intelligent workload management market.”

Gartner blogger Chris Wolf on Sept. 16 wrote that in announcing that a SUSE Linux Enterprise Server license would be included with vSphere licenses, VMware also talked about how it would train its support organization to offer SUSE Linux support. “The fact that VMware was making an investment in its support organization hinted at the potential of a larger deal,” says Wolf.

“In addition, VMware stated that its virtual appliance authoring tool, VMware Studio, would eventually offer SUSE Linux as the default VMware appliance OS. This marked a significant departure from VMware’s own Just Enough OS (JeOS) operating system,” Wolf adds.

Wolf goes on to write that an acquisition by VMware of Novell would make sense given JeOS hasn’t received widespread acceptance in the enterprise. And he adds that while VMware competitors Microsoft, Oracle (News - Alert) and Red Hat offer hypervisors as part of solutions based on their own operating systems, VMware “is at the mercy of OS vendors and it’s understandable that its competitors would optimize their own OSs to work best with their hypervisor offerings.”

While Novell has some attractive solutions, the company has been grappling with falling revenues. Net income in the third quarter fell to $15.7 million, or 4 cents per share, from $16.7 million, or 5 cents per share, from a year ago. Revenue dropped 8 percent to $199 million from $216 million. Of course, Novell attributed that to “customer uncertainty over the company's possible sale.”

The company’s board on March 20 authorized a review of various alternatives to enhance stockholder value. According to that announcement: “These alternatives include, but are not limited to, a return of capital to stockholders through a stock repurchase or cash dividend, strategic partnerships and alliances, joint ventures, a recapitalization and a sale of the company.”

This move by the board came in the wake of Novell’s rejection of Elliott Associates L.P.’s proposal to acquire the company for $5.75 per share in cash, an offer the company called inadequate.

http://tmcnet.com/41596.1
Gartner Deems Digium (News - Alert) a Visionary

Digium, a provider of open source-based products, has been positioned in the Visionaries quadrant of Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Corporate Telephony report. Digium has been steadily growing for the last 10 years and provides a range of phone systems and custom telephony solutions for small, medium and large businesses. In the last year, Digium introduced a new version of its unified communications phone system, expanded its channel program with new partners, and provided training and certification opportunities and an online community marketplace for Asterisk (News - Alert
www.digium.com

http://tmcnet.com/41597.1
Actel (News - Alert) Appeals to SmartFusion Set

Unison is an ultra tiny Linux compatible OS for SmartFusion smart mobile devices. When using SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs, developers now have the option for Linux-based embedded design. Ease of adoption of SmartFusion devices for embedded designers will be provided by Actel  as it continues to broaden its ecosystem. Wendy Lockhart, senior manager of design solutions marketing and training at Actel says: "Our ability to offer a Linux-compliant OS opens the door for a whole new range of SmartFusion designers.These designers now have access not only to a Linux operating system but an OS that has a modular memory so they can further reduce the memory footprint."
www.actel.com

http://tmcnet.com/41598.1
Timesys Does Cloud-Based Linux

Timesys Corp. has announced the release of Web Factory, a free edition of its LinuxLink offering. Web Factory enables Linux newbies and experienced developers to start building applications on day one. Timesys is the first commercial Linux vendor to offer a free, "in the cloud" application that gives platform and application developers an easy tool to quickly start building Linux applications. Web Factory combines everything developers need to test and evaluate a processor without having to set up host build environments and before finalizing hardware selection. An easy-to-use wizard guides them through each step.
www.timesys.com




Edited by Jaclyn Allard