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Caldera and SCO: it's official. Caldera Systems and SCO announced this week the purchase deal that has been
rumored for some time now. LWN attended the "analyst conference call" on
the merger; here's what we were able to pick up.
The deal itself is as follows. Caldera Systems will pick up the Server
Software and Professional Services divisions of SCO. A new holding
company, called simply "Caldera, Inc." will be created to take possession
of the new groups. Ransom Love will be Caldera Inc.'s CEO, while David
McCrabb from SCO will become the President and COO. What SCO gets out of
the deal is 28% of Caldera, Inc., $7 million in cash, and an
$18 million loan from the Canopy Group, the major stockholder in
Caldera. SCO also retains the "OpenServer revenue stream", even though it
is Caldera that "will have exclusive distribution rights for the SCO
OpenServer product line, and is fully committed to servicing and supporting
the SCO OpenServer customer base."
SCO will also hold on to its outside investments, such as the stake in LinuxMall.com.
Caldera's plan is to build a unified product line out of its current Linux
offerings and SCO's products. They see Linux as being best suited to the
lower end systems, while UnixWare works better at the high end, especially
in clustering applications. In general, SCO's clustering seems to be
Caldera's path into this very competitive area. Caldera also has high
hopes for Monterey as the high-end system for the IA-64 architecture. In
all of these cases, they emphasize that there will be a single API for
developers to use - the Linux API.
Caldera also gets SCO's channels and its large list of customers. SCO's
logos are also part of the deal, leading to the question of what the
remainder of SCO will call itself. They had no answer to that, but pointed
out that "Tarantella, Inc." already exists; since Tarantella will be the
core of SCO's operation now, there is an obvious name change there.
Will SCO's products be released as open source? Caldera's answer was, at
best, ambiguous. There was a lot of talk about "source access" licenses -
meaning, perhaps, that if you license the products you can get at the
source but not redistribute it. Caldera also devoted a lot of words to how
it gives back to the community, so it's clear they feel some pressure
there. But it's not clear how they will respond.
Needless to say, Caldera is upbeat about the deal. They claim that the
company is now the first to show a truly coherent Linux business model with
a clear path to profitability. Time will tell...
(For more information, see this
SEC filing from Caldera, which covers most of the important parts of
the deal. Also some of the less important points: "Both companies will
continue to use the SCO Cafeteria in Santa Cruz. Ingrid and her staff will
continue to produce their tasty creations.")
Linux on IBM's S/390.
Here is the
formal announcement from IBM of its new pricing structure for Linux
on the S/390.
For those using Linux on the S/390, Computer Associates
announced that it is making "a comprehensive suite of eBusiness
management software" available, including Unicenter, MasterIT,
Ingres, ARCserv, and eTrust, and BMC Software has
announced that its "PATROL" and "Knowledge Module" system
management tools are available with a free trial period offer.
More Red Hat News.
Singapore based Donovan Systems
will bundle Red Hat Linux on its 64 bit hardware systems.
Red Hat, Inc.
completed the acquisition of WireSpeed Communications
Corporation Inc.
Red Hat and Ericsson have announced a deal to jointly develop a range of consumer products oriented around home
communications. The first such product will be Ericsson's "Cordless
Screen Phone," due to be available by the end of this year.
Aug. 4 is Last Day for Nominations.
A position is being made available, for the second year, to the
Linux development/Open Source community on the International
Softswitch Consortium (ISC),
paid for by Vovida Networks. Nominations for the position are
open until August 4. A list of nominees will be posted Monday,
August 7, 2000 at Vovida's web
site.
Set-top Boxes.
Bluepoint Linux Software Corp. has
announced the signing of a letter of intent to develop a Chinese
Linux system for a new set top box to be deployed by Bridge Group.
Coollogic
announced the availability of a new, Linux-based set-top box
designed to enable Internet access via a television set.
Press Releases:
Commercial Products for Linux.
-
LinuxSolve, Inc. (SANTA CLARA, Calif.) announced the vHost
secure server appliance, a secure Linux-based virtual hosting
solution.
- Loki Software has announced a deal
with Epic Games wherein Loki will maintain and support the Linux
version of Unreal Tournament.
- SteelEye Technology has
announced the launch of a high-availability version of the Apache
web server. It includes fault detection and failover capabilities to
keep a site up even when individual servers fail. It's supported on
Caldera and Red Hat.
- TurboLinux has
announced the launch of "TurboLinux DataServer," a version of its
distribution with IBM's DB2 integrated. Cost is $2500.
Products Using Linux.
-
RSA Security Inc. (BEDFORD, Mass.) announced that the NetMAX
division of Cybernet Systems Corporation has licensed RSA BSAFE
Crypto-C security software for inclusion in its NetMAX
family of Linux-based Internet appliance software.
Products with Linux Versions.
-
Compaq Computer Corporation (HOUSTON) introduced the
StorageWorks RAID Array 4100 SAN.
- Digitex Technology
Services, Inc. (St. Louis, Missouri) has a number of products with
Linux versions, and will soon introduce 1U and 2U rackmount Linux
firewalls. The line of Linux products can be found at www.digitex.cc/Products/.
-
Engineous Software Inc. (MORRISVILLE, N.C.) added Linux support
for iSIGHT 5.5; integration, automation, and design improvement
software.
-
Mentalix Inc. (PLANO, Texas) is now shipping Pixel!FX
2000, an imaging and scanning product line.
-
Piranha, Inc. (DALLAS) announced its streaming media technology,
Piranha Stream.
-
Port25 Solutions, Inc. (ELLICOTT CITY, Md.) announced
PowerMTA, a Message Transfer Agent (MTA) primarily for
delivering large volumes of outbound Email messages.
-
ViewSonic Corporation (WALNUT, Calif.) announced it is unveiling
Internet appliances that will be bundled with AT&T WorldNet Service.
Java Products.
-
FatWire (MINEOLA, N.Y.) announced the release of UpdateEngine
5, a platform for e-business.
Books & Training.
- O'Reilly has released the third edition of the book
Programming Perl. "Any Perl book can
show the syntax of Perl's functions, but only "The Camel Book" is a
comprehensive guide to all the nooks and crannies of the
language."
- Boston University Corporate Education Center
has partnered with CIW to offer its clients the Certified Internet
Webmaster (CIW) program.
-
Wave Technologies (ST. LOUIS) adds boot camps in IT
Security, Oracle 8i Dba, Java, And Internet Technologies.
Partnerships.
-
Collab.Net (SAN FRANCISCO) and SkillsVillage.com announced a
strategic alliance in which Collab's SourceXchange will link with
SkillsVillage.com's solution.
-
Extended Systems (Boise, IDAHO), provider of Linux-based Internet
access solutions, has been accepted as an Associate member of the
Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG).
-
Force Computers (SAN JOSE, Calif.) announced the "Running with
Force" third-party alliance program to supply communications
equipment manufacturers with a range of embedded solutions. Current
Force partners include LynuxWorks and MontaVista Software Inc.
-
Inprise/Borland (SCOTTS VALLEY, Calif.) announced that
InterBase 6.0 is shipping with Cobalt Network's RaQ 4r.
-
InterLan Technologies (RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C.) selected
Caldera Systems to provide the Linux operating systems in its
Internet Utility Center.
-
Linuxcare, Inc. (SAN FRANCISCO) has teamed with Compaq Computer
Corporation through the Compaq
Solutions Alliance program to simplify Linux installation on Alpha
servers with the introduction of Linux Jumpstart! CD.
- LinuxDevices reports
on the merger of LynuxWorks, Inc. (Blue Cat Linux) and ISDCorp (Royal
Linux). "It significantly increases the size and scope of the
LynuxWorks' professional services organization, thereby enabling them
to better support the needs of customers who choose to develop
Linux-based products. In addition, LynuxWorks will now have Linux
support for a wider variety of target processors including ARM and
MIPS."
-
OnCore Systems Corporation (HALF MOON BAY, Calif.) announced
support for International Business Machine's new line of PowerPC 405
embedded processors.
-
Qualys, Inc. (SUNNYVALE, Calif.) is integrating
SecurityFocus.com vulnerability information as part of its
QualysGuard service.
- SiliconPenguin.com
has
announced a partnership with LinuxDevices.com; it seems to
involve the use of news from LinuxDevices on the SiliconPenguin site.
- SuSE Linux AG and Trustix
(Nuremberg, Germany and Trondheim, Norway) announced a partnership to
ensure that XPloy is compatible with SuSE Linux.
-
Syrinex Communications Corporation (BUFFALO, N.Y.) announced an
agreement with Barrister Global Services Network. Barrister
will provide field installation and support services throughout North
America for Syrinex's Linux-based NexServer line of Internet server
appliances.
Investments and Acquisitions.
- Inprise/Borland has evidently been talking with another company
about selling InterBase, at the same time that it has been
open-sourcing the product. Now the company has
announced that those talks are over, and InterBase will not be
sold.
- Linuxcare has
announced the completion of a new round of funding:
$30 million from Dell, Motorola, Sun and ITOCHU International.
Financial Results.
Personnel.
- Data Mirror
has appointed Mr. Wayne Howard as its new vice president and CFO.
Linux At Work.
- 3Dgeo has purchased a 32 node linux cluster from NetworX for processing seismic data. "3DGeo Development,
Inc., a leading innovator in 3-D advanced seismic imaging technology,
has purchased a 32-processor cluster system from Linux NetworX to use
in its high computation data processing application. According to
3DGeo, the high performance computing market is experiencing a
paradigm shift from traditional supercomputers and large parallel
servers to Linux cluster systems."
Section Editor: Rebecca Sobol.
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August 3, 2000
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