Can Microsoft Surround And Conquer Red Hat?
Yet another open source software provider has signed a licensing and patent agreement with Microsoft. The VAR Guy wonders: Is Microsoft moving a few strategic pieces into place before launching a legal showdown against Red Hat? Or is this another case of Microsoft spreading Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) within the open source community?
First, some background: Microsoft claims Linux and open source software violate more than 200 of the company’s patents. Novell was the first big Linux provider to sit down with Microsoft and sign a cross-licensing agreement with the company. The deal essentially protects Novell and its customers from potential legal action by Microsoft. Oh, and it also delivers greater interoperability between Windows and Linux — something that Novell and Microsoft customers certainly want.
Meanwhile, two smaller Linux providers — Xandros and Linspire — have now signed similar patent agreements with Microsoft. And, AP reports, device makers like Samsung and LG Electronics have inked open source patent agreements with Microsoft.
Who’s next on Microsoft’s target list? The VAR Guy thinks Collax — which promotes its own Linux to small businesses — is on Microsoft’s legal radar for patent negotiations. And tiny Collax would likely welcome a call from the giant.
After all, mainstream technology writers had never heard of Xandros until the company recently signed the Microsoft patent deal. Now, Xandros is on the media map–at least temporarily. That situation could repeat itself with Collax, which currently competes with Microsoft’s Small Business Server.
And what about Canonical, promoter of the popular Ubuntu Linux? Mark Shuttleworth, the man behind Ubuntu, says he’d love to strike a balanced deal when Microsoft has new, community-focused leadership. (No offense, Bill and Steve.) But regardless of Microsoft’s leadership, Shuttleworth insists he would “absolutely not” sign a patent agreement with the software giant.
Neither would Red Hat — according to multiple published reports.
Suddenly, Microsoft’s strategy is clear to The VAR Guy: Line up tiny Linux companies to sign patent agreements. Then, let everyone — including The VAR Guy — speculate about a possible legal showdown with Red Hat.
Hmmm. So far, the strategy doesn’t appear to be slowing Red Hat’s momentum. Annual revenue at the company grew 44 percent during Red Hat’s most recent fiscal year.
While Microsoft continues signing open source patent agreements, Red Hat continues signing up new customers.
All deals signed after March 28 are invalid. But no one talks about it. Clearly those not knowing do not know anything at all.
[…] Guy begs to differ. Mark Shuttleworth, the man behind Ubuntu, is on record stating that he#8217;s not interested in a patent deal with […]
@Brotherred:
Why are the deals made after March 28 invalid?
This article is wrong because Novell partnership with Microsoft start before the ‘200 patents’ announcement.
Igor,
Yes, the Novell agreement came before Microsoft disclosed the alleged 200+ patent violations. But that doesn’t make the article wrong.
The moment Microsoft announced the agreement with Novell, Ballmer and others stated that they believed open source violated Microsoft patents. Novell denies this, but nonetheless signed that agreement.
Regardless, there are clearly three Linux companies that have patent protection from Microsoft — even if the protection means nothing: Novell, Linspire, Xandros.
Its a pity how linux community is scared of MS. Does this show that we at linux have really been infringing the patents (Ok, we all know Linux has infringed). Anyways, i am tired of reading these alike blogs where everyone is speculating MS would invade top linux distributions, ofcourse this is what they want and this is what every other rival company would do. Thats nature of business and i dont blame MS. MS in intelligent enough (they are as- doesnt matter if you guys TRY to deny it) to act at the right time and make friends with Linux community as they want strong linkage with Linux development in the years to come. To my mind, all they want is to have M$ embedded inside Linux and then cripple it at the end whenever they want.
Naaah!what MS is doing is weeding out those clueless Linux providers for us. They have no idea how to provide Linux solutions so they need a crutch to lean on.
When all the dust settles only the real Linux providers will remains. And the world continues spinning on…
DL
mmmm! you may be partially right DL, but Novell (suse) is a top brand. I think MS has decided to invade into linux so much that one day linux will be MS! And its the server war this time, for desktop you cannot beat MS.
From Linux i mean the whole OS distribution, not the boring monolithic Kernel. 😛
Well, when you consider that Microsoft is following the same script that The SCO Group ne Caldera followed – allege massive illegalities with the Linux kernel and related operating system, then sign up clueless folks etc, I hope you’ll see that Microsoft is also likely to find itself bankrupt and in breach of so many other things that their collective heads’ll spin like a top.
I think Microsoft’ll last at this game for perhaps another few companies, then by the time they decide to take on Red Hat, Microsoft’ll be left sitting on the quickly-dwindling $49 billion cash …
There’s a lot more people supporting Red Hat now than used to, and the number of Linux folks accusing Red hat of aiming to be the Linux Microsoft is now NULL. Microsoft will spring its big surprise, only to find it’s snookered itself beyond retrieval.
divide an infiltrate absorb
MS isnt dumb by long shot
FTA: “After all, mainstream technology writers had never heard of Xandros until the company recently signed the Microsoft patent deal.”
What? Exactly what is a mainstream technology writer anyway? Any tech writer not knowing about Xandros isn’t aware of the landscape and should be set aside as just another damned blogger.
I agree with Johannes above. I don’t get paid for writing about technology yet I was aware of Xandros almost as soon as it started – it USED to be Corel Linux. Xandros bought most of Corel’s assets 5 or 6 years ago.
Mainstream writers should be quite aware of the several Linux distributions that make a major point of being for Windows converts and “newbie-friendly”.
I’m not sure MS could “OS/2” Red Hat on patents alone.
If Microsoft actually tried to attack Red-Hat with the 200+ patents then three things will happen
Some will get laughed out of court as being so weak as to be pointless
Some will get nullified by Prior Art
The rest will be worked around in days…
It is also likely that IBM will wade in with it’s portfolio of Patents
So Microsoft will end up with less patents a large bill and Red-Hat will carry on as if nothing had happend?
[…] leap from niche desktops to small business servers. But I wonder what that means for companies like Xandros and Collax #8212; both of which promote Linux to small […]