New Financing And Fewer Staff @ SuSE

jdfox writes: "According to this press release from SuSE, they have just received another 15 million Euros (about 14 million $US) venture capital, with some big names listed in the consortium's membership. They have also announced that a quarter of their 500 staff will be let go, following on from similar recent cuts. This excellent distro deserves to succeed: I hope this move will see them through the current slowdown." The upcoming release (needs babelfishing from German) of SuSE's version 7.3 promised for October 13th is loaded with a ton of goodies, too -- Kernel 2.4.10, KDE 2.2.1 and GNOME 1.4.1 beta2, among other things.

Comments

Love the SuSE

[lessthan0]

I've run almost 10 different distros (counting the BSDs) and I always come back to SuSE. With the crypto now in the kernels by default and the firehose of apps, SuSE kicks it mack daddy fresh.

I hope they can pull out of the general slump and get profitable again or we'll all be running RedHat XP.

Re:Love the SuSE

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope they can pull out of the general slump and get profitable again

You mean they were profitable at one time?

pronunciation

[quannump]

how do you pronounce SuSE? sue-see? sue-zee? sooz?

Buy Linux Incentive

[sabinm]

With this 14 million dollars, they should focus marketing on their Distro in EU circles.
The popularity of SuSe is great in Europe and it wouldn't be as great of a challenge to convert users and organizations to Linux.

If they gave corporations and govt. incentives to purchase SuSe, like deals w/the OEMs to make systems that were preinstalled and came w/loads of Tech Support, they could throw a monky wrench in the Software licensing scheme.

Say for instance the incentives that companies had with Compaq 7 years ago. My dad got a 386/sx with windows 3x for about 1500 - a cost that was footed by the company.The same thing could be done for Linux today. Get a significant cash incentive, install some killer apps, along with a smooth game (Quake) for after hours and a internet connection and you can hook the average consumer on Linux. Next time they go out to buy a box, the consumer will most likely stick with SuSe.

Worked for MS, should work for SuSe.
All I'm saying is that you already have a product that is good, it's time to put it on display. Let it sink or float according to its merits.

Don't spend too much more time on a near perfect product. It's time to let it out to play with the big boys.