What Sun should do next

WHEN IS A BIG cross-licensing deal not a big cross-licensing deal? When it's a press release, maybe.

Sun and Microsoft scored a few headlines this week with a pact that will see Sun preinstall and support Windows on servers. I'm not sure this is such a big deal. Ever since it started to ship AMD boxes, Sun has had a small Windows business. Scott McNealy even referred to it in the speech he gave to analysts on the day he announced his plan to step down. Sun makes great hardware but making a big dent on the volume players is a big ask.

What else is in the pact? Sun and Microsoft will work together so each can virtualise the other. And they're going to have an interoperability lab. Well, they would, wouldn't they?

Nope, this won't wash. So far the Sun-Microsoft pact is the most underwhelming pact since, well the Sun-Google pact - and what the heck happened to that?

So here's a couple of suggestions for what Sun should be doing together to make life a bit more interesting.

One, Windows for Sparc. Scott McNealy used to take shots at Microsoft for not porting Windows to Sun's architecture but those were the days when Sun was obsessed with annoying Microsoft. Now that the cold war between the two is over it might be worth reviving the idea. Windows on Alpha wasn't a complete failure and Sparc offers a lot more volume than Digital ever did. The latest SunFire boxes are screamers and sip power. Microsoft needs to show it's taking security, stability and the environment seriously so the timing would be good.

Two, a merger. Sun is still an amazing company with tremendous R&D but compared to IBM and HP it looks increasingly weedy. That can't help it when it's seeking big deals with big companies. It's already tight with Fujitsu so why not go the whole hog and combine with it. Then if Fujitsu and Siemens also formalied their long relationship and tied the knot you would have a huge new global player in hardware, software and services with massive presence in Japan, Europe and the US.

Sun used to be the company with the biggest cojones on the planet but now it gives us wishy-washy handshaking agreements to be good buddies. We need more than that. µ