Novell speaks on Microsoft deal

WE SPOKE to Novell European president Tom Francese in the wake of the Microsoft pact to get some reaction on the deal.

INQ: What's your immediate reaction to the deal?

TF: I like Steve Ballmer's statement that people said this could never be done. From an open-source community point of view I would say: nothing can stop us now. The movement has been fully embraced by one of the last bastions, Microsoft. We can go to market with IBM, HP, Dell, but now that includes Microsoft.

INQ: Any reaction from users yet?

TF: We had calls throughout the night. I'm an out-in-the-field person and customers have been calling saying 'now we can select an open-source partner and if we select Suse Linux we are completely free and unencumbered by concerns on intellectual property'.

INQ: But previously open-source vendors have always argued that there is no major user concern on IP…

TF: There's always been the bogeyman thing. We always felt we're OK to move forwards and now there's no grey area at all. There's always a boardroom discussion about risk in any project so another barrier has been taken down.

INQ: A lot of vendor pacts don't add up to much. Why is this different?

TF: We all feel a little bit better that Microsoft is taking a step forward and recognising interoperability with open source. We have a five-year agreement with Microsoft. It's not short-term and you'll see more detail inside 60 days with the SEC [regulatory] filing. There are going to be financial benefits for both companies.

INQ: Is this a community win or a Novell win over Red Hat?

TF: We think about customers first and then the community but I would tell you it's a competitive advantage.

INQ: But often there's a follow-up with these deals where the big vendor repairs fences with the other company affected by the alliance. Is there going to be a Microsoft-Red Hat pact next?

TF: This is going to put some pressure on Red Hat and that's not going to change anytime in the near future.

INQ: The virtualisation stuff is intriguing. Does it mean that you'll be displacing Xen with Microsoft's Viridian virtualisation code in Suse Linux?

TF: We're going to have this virtualisation lab and the two teams are going to be closer. We're going to find a way to improve support on what Microsoft is doing on virtualisation. We don't see it conflicting [with current strategies].

INQ: How about OpenOffice, Microsoft Office and document formats?

TF: There's always been this struggle to interoperate well and we think we'll be better served on document interchange. We have learned in the past that this shouldn't be a threat to either company and taking it up a level will benefit everybody. Religious wars are not productive and are a thing of the past. µ