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Could Microsoft Buy Red Hat?
An anonymous reader writes "Various news sources including ZDnet are today reporting that Microsoft is considering buying out Red Hat, speculating that 'Microsoft could see Red Hat's acquisition as a nice way to undermine IBM, but might not consider that a sufficient reason to do it,' adding that Red Hat is however '...a company that wants to be Microsoft and, like Microsoft, makes its living packaging and selling other people's ideas.'" That description seems to miss the key point that Red Hat releases the software they package and sell as Free software, and that both companies pay coders to create and improve software in the first place.
Doesn't red hat sell support?
Gates: Your Internet ad was brought to my attention, but I can't figure out what, if anything, Red Hat does, so rather than risk competing with you, I've decided simply to buy you out
Homer: I reluctantly accept your proposal!
Gates: Well everyone always does. Buy 'em out, boys!
Technology, the cause of and solution to all of life's problems.
"Until Longhorn is fully operational we are vulnerable. Linux is too well equipped. It's more dangerous than you realize."
"Dangerous to your OS division, not to my Office line."
"Linux will continue to gain support along with OpenOffice as long as Red Hat continues to..."
"Red Hat will no longer be of any conern to us. I've just received word that the Emperor has purchased Red Hat and has ordered a completely new version of Linux that will be released sometime in the near future... IE not at all. The last remants of Unix have been swept away."
I was reading this with a 'this just might be' attitude, until I came across "This combined with the the fact that the single biggest threat Red Hat faces right now is that of the possiblity of IBM could settling with SCO and then release its own Linux, (...)
IBM settling with SCO while they seem to be holding them at their balls? And then releasing their own linux distro? Yeah, right.
This 'article' is nothing, ziltch, nada, nop. No new facts, no reasoning, no nothing.
Wenn ist das Nunstueck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
If they did...what exactly would they be getting? a Duplicate company called...say "Blue hat" could pop up in a couple of weeks with a duplicate copy of everything Redhat sells (besides the copyrighted red fedora) and start selling copies just like before.
Redhat's profits are primarily from service contracts and their automated patch udpates.
Remeber...everything is GPL'd...so buying out Redhat would at most just give MS some time (against Redhat ONLY)....there ARE other LINUX distros out there....like Mandrake...SuSE.....MEPIS...debian......
Interesting, although I read this blog entry earlier and it is good food for thought.
1. This could be viewed as a 'strategic acquisition' so as to provide 'leading edge technologies' from wherever they were. Then, they could release brain-dead and damaged versions of RedHat Linux that failed under certain conditions;
2. Admitting that Linux has redeeming qualities is not a problem given that the marketplace has already proved that. Like NASA's mantra, "Buy It and Kill It" (tm) would be an easy operation to undertake.
It would dramatically confuse the market
3. Dramatically confusing the market would work in Microsoft's favor. further, they would offer "upgrade paths" that start in Linux and go towards MS Server 2k3 in short order.
As a way to reduce competition, this might make total sense. Yes, it would be profoundly evil, and the antitrust authorities might look at it that way, too, but given the Bush administration's justice dept., any challenge to (potential or actual) big money donors seems unlikely.
Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
If Microsoft bought Red Hat, wouldn't this mean that Microsoft would be under the GPL when it comes to releasing software?
I'm glad you asked that, because I collect stupid questions and I hadn't seen that one before.
The Windows Services for Unix package includes GPL'ed code, including gcc.
Instead of Red Hat, MSFT would be better off buying Sun- they both sell propriatary systems, both dislike linux (not Sun so much, but they do) and it would be an extension of many of the deals they have struck recently. I don't see where RH makes sense, but I can see a better story with Sun given the slump in their stock, etc....
# nohup
Why?
- Sun has valuable patents that fit Microsoft's new IP strategy.
- The can get their 2 billion back from Sun that way.
- Sun and Microsoft have a good working relationship; could be rephrased as McNealey makes Balmer Smile
- and most importantly, it
seems like McNealey wants to sell
Buying RedHat wouldn't hurt IBM at all considering that they're at least as much a SuSE/Novell partner as they are a redhat partner.For all of the insane articles that percolate to the surface on /., this article is impressively insane.
So what "various news sources" are cited here?
"News source #1" is Paul Murphy of ZDNet, who basically says "gee, I suppose it's *possible* that M$ could buy RH, but, um, not really."
"News source #2: is "whitedust," the well-known... er, well-respected... er, who are they again? Anyway, the quote from "whitedust"...
"On the surface of it, the concept of Microsoft buying out Red Hat does indeed seem rather humorous. However as commented in the ZDnet article; Red Hat is a company that shares much the same business model as Microsoft in that essentially it makes it's (sic) living packaging and selling other people's ideas. That alone is enough to give some credabilty (sic) to the notion of some kind of thoretical ethical union one that would perhaps be less likley (sic) with any other open source developer."
So, to recap:
Coke-snorting "whitedust" website claims that Red Hat and Microsoft are a perfect pair, editorializes that purchase is imminent!
Really, truly, impressively insane.
This would all make sense if RedHat could be purchased at a reasonable price. But right now RedHat is worth around 2 billion (they reported worth in their annual report of just over 1 billion based on at that time stock value or 7.25, stock is now 12.55, of course MS just needs to purchase a majority share.. And I'm not going to dig through their annual report that deeply.
Anyways most of what is RedHat is a free open-source program. So what would Microsoft be buying.
1. A building.
2. Its Employees (many of which would jump ship)
3. Some private code
4. The name (would would immediently be destroyed in many peoples eyes when Microsoft buys it)
This would effectivly be the worlds largest waste of money. While it may have some small long term goal of shutting down their compitition. Microsoft share holders would NEVER go for a billion+ dollar aquasition that would have almost nothing tangable about it.
MSFT has spent billions on marketing the idea that Windows is better in the server room than Unix and Linux. For them to turn around and buy a tier-1 Unix vendor would completely undermine that position. Likewise, Solaris is one of the few commercial OSes that can beat windows in the server room on technical merit, name recognition, and PHB appeal; for that reason it would be VERY unlikely that any merger would be approved.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
Exactly... people dont realize how much Red Hat does for the community. Most distros just package up pre-existing software and bundle it in an easy to use way. Red Hat actually writes the stuff and pays a lot of devlopers a lot of money to do it. They've contributed far more code then any other entity in the kernel, they also nearly completely coded all of Gnome except for a few tidbits here and there (they even host Gnome.org) They've done wonders for Open Office on linux, including coding GCJ so that all the java components for OO.o could be compiled natively and distributed without a JVM.(They also played a big role in getting OO.o to use native widgets) Red Hat coders also do a hell of a lot of coding for Apache and make major advancements in all sorts of areas like File Systems and enterprise stability. They were a key force in getting SELinux into the kernel, as well as coding most of the drivers that are used in your hardware, and are in large part a reason why linux is considered business ready today. Now they are pushing major advancements in Linux's graphics capabilities and giving it a modern day desktop with modern day capabilites. The list could go on for quite a bit longer but I think I'll stop there. For all the knocking that people do of Red Hat, they sure as hell do alot for the community.
Regards,
Steve
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RedHat has all of their developers sign agreements with very interesting & strict terms. I've signed 2 of them in the past 3 years (changed projects). It's an understatement to say that they will not be quitting and working for suse any time soon.
Would Redhat have to change it's name to Asshat if Microsoft bought them?