Slashdot Mirror
SCO Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy
Can you say "the SCO, the" in German? writes "Trading of SCO's stock has been halted on news that SCO has filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. This move just so happens to fall on the eve of SCO's trial with Novell. One would think that their prior boasts were mostly bluster, that they believe they have almost no chance of prevailing at trial, and that they're now desperate to protect their executives from SCO's creditors while seeking yet another delay. From the release: 'The SCO Group intends to maintain all normal business operations throughout the bankruptcy proceedings. Subject to court approval, SCO and its subsidiaries will use the cash flow from their consolidated operations to meet their capital needs during the reorganization process. "We want to assure our customers and partners that they can continue to rely on SCO products, support and services for their business critical operations," said Darl McBride, President and CEO, The SCO Group. "Chapter 11 reorganization provides the Company with an opportunity to protect its assets during this time while focusing on building our future plans."'"
I think PJ needs to send the red dress to the cleaners, so it will be ready when she needs it!
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Chapter 11 is bankruptcy protection. A company can emerge from chapter 11 (SGI did), but it's usually a preamble to a chapter 7, which means liquidation and game over, pal.
According to Wikipedia the English term is epicaricacy.
Actually, it plummeted as the insiders and people with inside knowledge traded out- trading is halted as soon as chapter 11 is filed. It might be interesting to see who actually sold today in the minutes prior to the announcement. The SEC has been known to take a close look at that in the past.
What a strange bird is the pelican, his beak can hold more than his belly can.
For those that don't get the reference to "the SCO, the" in German, it comes from Episode 9F22 "Cape Feare" of the Simpsons.
Sideshow Bob is applying for parole claiming that he wouldn't pose a danger to Bart:
Lawyer: "Don't you have a tattoo that says 'die, Bart, die' on your chest?"
Sideshow Bob: "No! That's German. It means 'the Bart, the'".
Parole Officer 1: "No one who speaks German could be an evil man!"
Parole Officer 2: "Parole granted!"
"There is no knowledge that is not power"
Too late. Your stock price feed most likely has a time delay built in. Trading will have been halted as soon as the news comes out. This is the insiders dumping their stock before the news gets out.
Not quite. In the case of the royalty money, the rulings thus far are that the royalties are Novell's, not SCO's, money. There's a question of the dollar amount to be determined, but that money isn't a debt owed to Novell so bankruptcy doesn't shield it. Read up on "conversion", which is the term the judge used. If you steal money from someone, you can't use bankruptcy protection to retain it since it's not yours in the first place.
The problem with this theory is that Novell is not a creditor.
The court ruled that the money *belongs* to Novell. That's a far different legal issue than SCO owing money to Novell.
It's like a burglar trying to claim bankruptcy in order to keep the stuff he stole. Since the stuff isn't actually his (and in this case has been declared so in a court of law), bankruptcy doesn't protect it.
Bankruptcy judges and trustees have carte blanche to deal with creditors, and limit the effects of ongoing litigation. On Monday, everything changes in front of Judge Kimball, who will put the suit into stasis, and give at least a 60 day cooling off period to everything.
It might turn into a Chapter 7 filing afterwards, and SCO might be forced to liquidate. This is unlikely, however. In the interim, they'll try to convince a judge or referee that they have IP assets that need protecting, along with their agreements with various companies, and will produce a lot of smoke in their quest to simply survive.
Much attorneys fees will be spent by many companies. Much continued incivility and plain poo will continue to be the hallmark of SCO's perhaps brief existence. Like others, they don't quit until they're just dead. Don't look for much come-uppance. This ends badly, just as it began badly.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
That isn't to say that SCO is safe, but news that they're filing for bankruptcy doesn't really mean anything.
You want an example of companies that go bankrupt while maintaining operations?
See: US Airline Industry
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
They are literally filing for bankruptcy and assuring their customers that they are fine and can rely on them at the same time... AT THE SAME TIME!
That's what Chapter 11 bankruptcy is all about. It allows you to reorganize your business and liabilities so you can stay in business.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Well, like North American banks and Caribbean branches that have a *tonne* of legacy code running on AS/400's, business apps are still out there running in SCO environments, apps that are critical to the business, but which scare the shit out of the organisation in terms of even thinking about unwinding them out of their businesses.
SCO had a solid biz app developer network out there one upon a time, with a lot of re-seller support, a holdover from when they were *the* PC-based UNIX, long before daryl and his prick henchmen decided to pursue a new 'business model' [cough]pump-and-dump scheme[cough].
But I guess they're fsck'd now, and looking at a whole different risk - they'll *have* to start working on it.
And no, I'm not painting a tech-equivalence between a modern AS/400 installation and intel hardware running openserver 6. But the business process analogue is solid, I think.
[17] Leary, T., White, C., Wood, P. R., Bhabha, W. D., and Wirth, N. Lambda calculus considered harmful. In Proceedings
YAY! Party at my place everyone! Champange for all! :)
There's nothing to cheer about here. This is SCO's way of weaseling out of their legal liabilities. They conceivably now will not have to pay Novell, or at least not for a long while. It gives them time to continue their court cases without having to settle their debts.
It's a tactic. They're not out of business, at least not yet.