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2010-11-24
, 08:19
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Posts: 302 |
Thanked: 254 times |
Joined on Oct 2007
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#2
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2010-12-18
, 05:07
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Posts: 302 |
Thanked: 254 times |
Joined on Oct 2007
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#3
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The consortium is called CPTN Holdings, which was formed on November 4, 2010. The timing suggests that Microsoft had formed the consortium in early November to undertake the transaction. However, the news left two big unknowns. First, what patents did the consortium get? And second, what other companies were involved?
Although I have yet to see a detailed analysis of the patent portfolio’s value, it covers a number of areas, including mobile data networks, electronic licensing of software (likely including apps), and the distribution of multimedia content over the Internet. There could be significant legal defensive and offensive value buried in there.
Mueller’s post answered the question of who else was involved. The breakout is fascinating:
* Apple is a mobile powerhouse and has expanded quickly into tablets, which are somewhere between handsets and either desktops or notebooks.
* Microsoft is the traditional king of client computing and office productivity software, but is also huge in server operating systems and software. It also wants to quickly grow in cloud computing.
* Oracle is the market leader in database software. The Sun Microsystems acquisition brought server hardware, the MySQL database, and Java.
* EMC is not only the market leader in storage, but it controls VMWare, which is the top name in virtualization software.
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2011-01-12
, 11:41
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Posts: 302 |
Thanked: 254 times |
Joined on Oct 2007
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#4
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2011-02-12
, 19:09
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Posts: 302 |
Thanked: 254 times |
Joined on Oct 2007
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#5
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As Novell has more than $1billion in cash and an "MS-led" consortium is picking the still-living body for Novell's patents and IP, including the Unix copyrights, for $450M, you can see that Novell's legacy networking, enterprise, security and Linux operations are being sold for a very small premium indeed.
The #2 Linux vendor has also number of valuable enterprise partnerships, including with the likes of IBM.
Nokia has recently bet the company on open-source and the Linux ecosystem while trying to grow their resources on that front so the technologies and IP that Novell holds would be highly complementary to Nokia's current and future core operating software and networking needs.
Why isn't Nokia at the heart of an open-source consortium to acquire, protect and take advantage of Novell/SUSE's assets, esp. as it's all going on the cheap and to all the wrong (read: open-source hostile) parties?
Novell's biggest problem in recent years was their sullied reputation due to the Microsoft patent agreement. Having new and decent owners and management would remove that millstone while 'remoralizing' their workforce.
Nokia's "connecting people" technologies also need increasing tie-ins to wider networking, enterprise and institutional ecosystems. Developed (and increasingly developing) countries are in dire need of an updated modern IT infrastructure based on open standards (generally based on open-source).
Here would be an opportunity for Nokia or an OSS-centric consortium to repurpose Novell/SUSE's assets and expertise for mutually beneficial ends rather than seeing it dismantled and used against OSS.
It doesn't have to be "Adios, aMeego" to Novell, a Meego partner...