Sun has decided to make its software platform, Java, open source, not unlike the Linux OS that is marketed by Novell and Redhat. Microsoft recently teamed with Novell to distribute Windows with the Suse version of Linux.Sun’s argument for making Java open source is that it will be more attractive to customers and programmers. But, being free does not always drive adoption. There is a reason that Microsoft still owns the operating system business worldwide. Linux is free, but without a development path lead by one company, the software based can be hard to manage.One thing that is for certain is that the market does not care. Sun’s stock was up 1% on the news. The stock has been trading in a narrow range just above $5 for the last two months.The market already senses that Sun’s moves on software will not save the company. Sun has already open sourced its Solaris software, and the results have been hard to guage.Sun is a server company, plain and simple. It recent growth has not been organic. It has come from the acquisitions of SeeBeyond and StorageTek. While this is not necessarily bad, it begs the question of what will happen to Sun’s revenue next year when the comparisons include all of the acquired revenue.Sun’s new Niagara chip has gotten solid reviews and could help drive that company’s core server operations.But, for Sun’s better server products to gain share, they have to get by offerings from Hewlett-Packard, IBM, and Dell first. They are larger companies that Sun and they will not make it an easy passage.Douglas A. McIntyre can be reached at [email protected]. He does not own securities in companies that he writes about.
Sun’s Next Move (SUNW)(IBM)(HPQ)(DELL)(NOVL)MSFT)
Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.
McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.
His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.
A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.
TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.
McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.
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