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SuSE larger than RedHat

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the now-it-gets-crazy dept.

kris writes "German c't magazine has a story about SUSE (english site: suse.com) reporting a larger turnover that RedHat (26.6 Mio. DM == 15 Mio US$ vs. RedHat with 11 Mio. US$). Suse also reported earnings, while RedHat reported a loss of $130,000 during the same time." kris has translated the article below if you want. Else use babelfish. Here is a rough translation of the article:

Suse: We are the largest.

As a reaction to the IPO of RedHat, which requires the company to disclose its earnings, german Linux distributor Suse has disclosed their own numbers. While RedHat reported a turnover of $11M between March 1998 and February 1999, Suse reported a turnover of almost $15M (Deutschmark 26.6 M) between 01-Apr-1998 and 31-Mar-1999. Like RedHat, most of this is due to their distribution sales (Deutschmark 17.4M). Unlike RedHat, who lost $130.000 during this time, Suse was able to report earnings of an undisclosed amount during this time.

Both companies employ approx. 130 people each at the time and are growing rapidly: In 1Q1999 Suse reported a turnover of Deutschmark 9.5M, an increase of 230% compared to the year before. Since the funding of SUSE Inc. in the USA, german Distributor Suse is focusing more and more on the international market. CEO Roland Dyroff reported a larger than proportional growth of the US daugther. He did not want to answer direct questions about an IPO, though. "

1 of 252 comments (clear)

  1. My distro can beat up your distro... by emerson · · Score: 5


    "Well, my distro's company has 135 people on-staff, and yours only has 127."

    "Oh, yeah, well, my distro uses the latest version of the KNODE desktop, and yours defaults to an older version of GNM!"

    "Oh yeah, well, my distro has version 1.0.3a of libdumbthing, and yours is stuck at version 1.0.3!"

    "Oh yeah, well my distro is supported in my native language, at least!"

    "Oh yeah, well my distro's company channels 127% of their profits into development of Open Source software for getting food to Vietnamese orphans!"

    "Oh yeah, _VIETNAMESE_ orphans... that went out with glibc 2.0. My distro's entire staff pays $25/hour for the privelege of contributing to the code, into a fund to educate Laotian children to program in Java."

    "Whatever."

    "Moron."