it seems that the preoccupation with money rests solely in your post. Considering that you seem to have missed the other points in my original post, let me restate them:
- shift from hardware to the Internet sector - move from a market laggard to a market leader - take on a division that has not met expectations, but has the full resources of a capable parent company
There is much more to the game than money, like winning.
stale in the sense that the hardware side of tech is evolutionary at this point in time. Computers get faster and have more of "things" (storage, memory, etc.). But hardware is hardly innovative in the mainstream.
The software industry had become stale, in my opinion, but the Internet is driving significant change. Software is becoming less a product and more a service. The shift is dramatic, revolutionary to some segments. This is exactly why the Microsoft interactive services opportunity is so important to them... it's the platform that they plan to drive their next generation of services (revenues) through.
hardware is fiecely competitive in that price sensitivity is high and has forced margins to be pretty thin. It could also be considered more competitive in that players are consolidating and creating larger power positions and far reaching competitive pressure for lesser players, of which SGI is clearly one of.
Referring to the computer industry as a single industry is analagous to referring to the transporation industry or energy... it doesn't work. SGI and MS are in completely different segments, which are distinct in almost all facets.
I find it interesting and humorous to read the numerous posts and replies on slashdot. Among the many consistent themes are the conspiracies and conspirators that progagate throughout the tech industry. This theme is running on all cylinders with this story, the spectrum covers Belluzzo running SGI in the ground on purpose to a multifaceted attack on Linux by MS.
Before going further, let's agree on one thing: Belluzzo resigned from SGI for a presumably better position elsewhere in the industry... MS according to many reports.
Please take a second to humor me and consider the recent resignation of SGI's Belluzzo from your own career perspective.
1) let's say that you are employed by a company who is struggling to survive, much less take a leadership position, in a stale industry with low margins and fierce competition. 2) you are approached by the leading company in a high profile, media sexy, and wealthy industry. 3) further, you are approached to be the head of a division (essentially a company unto itself) that is struggling to overcome identity and marketing issues, but has the full commitment and resources of its wealthy parent company. In other words, this is a challenge but is doable. 4) you are enticed with cash and stock wealth of much higher certainty than your current position.
What would you do? It's not about loyalty or conspiracy, it's about a fundamental tenet of market economies... freedom to exercise choice
I am not that familiar with Be, other than by name and market space, but their opening day was very disappointing.
First of all, they hoped to raise $60m and when the issue finally priced, it only raised $36m for them. That sounds like a lot of money, but really is not for a high tech company. To convert that to real terms, a 200 person company can burn $3m a month just on overhead and salaries.
Also, the fact that they couldn't hit their target indicates that they were unconvincing on their roadshow. The roadshow is where price is set based on expected demand from institutional investors. An extreme case the other direction is Ariba, which priced up dramatically in the days leading upto the opening trade. Essentially, it's what the underwriter guarantees to sell their allocation at.
Finally, a 37% rise on the opening day is pitiful... it indicates that the retail investor saw little intrinsic value in the company or it's prospects for the future. Like it or not, a company stock price is a powerful currency used to attract great employees, secure business relationships and make acquisitions.
bullshit. He said he doesn't intend to do it in the near future. RH would never have scored investments without a forseeable exit strategy, IPO being the most likely.
Let's look at one software vendor whose entire business is providing mission critical business software - SAP. Over half of the new licenses they sell (and it's been this way for about 2 years) are for SAP R/3 on NT with Oracle/NT as the DB.
Most of the other vendors in the high end and mid-market enterprise space report the same trends.
Contrast that to Linux use for mission critical apps, SAP is unable to produce a single customer reference for R/3 on Linux, although the support for Linux has really only been recently provided.
Over time, NT will definitely face stronger competitive forces. Be objective and don't believe the spin just because it's of the flavor you prefer!
and I'm sure that everyone on/. is perfectly content to share the pie with Microsoft.
Bill alone did not build Microsoft, the entire ecosystem was responsible. The Linux community is motivated in a similar manner, to grow market share at a rate faster than the rate the market grows at, which implicitly means taking someone else's share away, in this case Microsoft.
I agree that organizational personality eminates from the top, but competitiveness is the nature of business. You can't become a market leader by accident.
Sorry, I seem to miss you insight... he's a great speaker because he bashes microsoft?
sustainable success cannot be achieved by defining what you are as "not microsoft". Focus on the proven benefits that Linux brings to market to meet the requirements of the target.
Hubris can come back to haunt you, just ask Andreeson.
It's through the efforts of "the ABOVE average Joe" who took a chance and went to work for Red Hat, the management team that had a vision AND an ability to execute, and the investors who made it possible through financial support that Red Hat is where it is.
All of the equity is not going to "big corporate players". Through each round of funding the valuation increases and new shares are issued. Investors in previous rounds are typically protected by an "anti-dilution clause" but that comes at a price - they have to invest in the new round pro rata to maintain their share. If previous investors do not invest pro rata, the amount of investor ownership pre money can actually decrease. Of course, there is also the employee option pool and founders stock in addition to outside investors. When the company files their S1, they will carve out a chunk of equity to go to the public markets... and the reality of recent IPO's is that the "float" (stock in the public market) is actually pretty slim. Pre-IPO investors also have the option of selling their stake once the lockup period has expired, increasing the amount of publicly traded shares.
The management, board of directors, investors and potential investors know how much is invested - it's in the capitalization table that is provided with the term sheet, purchase docs and other material.
The investment community doesn't make token investments, we put money to work to earn a significant return on investment. The hard truth is that it's not worth the time to invest for trivial percentages when other opportunities are available - it just takes too much time and effort.
implementation costs typically run 3-4x the software license cost. The problem for app vendors, like SAP, is that Wall St. looks to top line license revenue growth as the benchmark. Service revenue is lower margin than licenses. Furthermore, if you grow service revenue you can create channel conflict with the integrators.
At over US$5 billion in revenue, SAP is the largest enterprise application vendor worldwide. Oracle is larger in total revenue, but their application business is less than $1b. Microsoft is the largest software vendor worldwide in terms of total software sales. IBM's software business is significantly large as well, but you have to break out the numbers to rank it.
1. probably not 2. Through each investment round the valuation of the company grows (hopefully). The previous investors can contribute in subsequent rounds pro rata to preserve their share, or not and have their share diluted. When RH, or any company, files to go public with their S1 you can see who owns what. 3. Yes it is possible, but you have to be able to articulate what you are going to do for the company you are investing in. Companies do not just take money that is offered to them, they have to determine how active the potential investor will be and what value add they will contribute. 3a. Is corporate ownership bad? 3b. Absolutely
Distinguish between proprietary in the sense of someone owning it and proprietary in the sense of someone hiding it.
SAP already ships source code to all of it's customers, along with the ability to use SAP development tools or someone elses to modify it as they wish. If SAP customers wish to share their extensions or modifications, they are fully able to do that.
The fact still remains that someone has to pay for right to benefit from the application. This is not an OS, not a utility, but a mission critical application platform used to run large businesses. That software is used to create efficiencies and ultimately competitive advantages that realize those companies financial benefit.
Not impossible without database support for Linux
on
SAP invests in Red Hat
·
· Score: 1
SAP R/3 on Linux does not require database support for Linux... the app server is on Linux while the db server could be on anything from SQL Server on NT to DB2 on a 390.
Slashdot Mirror
I have the balls to put my name to my postings... I didn't see yours...
it seems that the preoccupation with money rests solely in your post. Considering that you seem to have missed the other points in my original post, let me restate them:
- shift from hardware to the Internet sector
- move from a market laggard to a market leader
- take on a division that has not met expectations, but has the full resources of a capable parent company
There is much more to the game than money, like winning.
stale in the sense that the hardware side of tech is evolutionary at this point in time. Computers get faster and have more of "things" (storage, memory, etc.). But hardware is hardly innovative in the mainstream.
The software industry had become stale, in my opinion, but the Internet is driving significant change. Software is becoming less a product and more a service. The shift is dramatic, revolutionary to some segments. This is exactly why the Microsoft interactive services opportunity is so important to them... it's the platform that they plan to drive their next generation of services (revenues) through.
hardware is fiecely competitive in that price sensitivity is high and has forced margins to be pretty thin. It could also be considered more competitive in that players are consolidating and creating larger power positions and far reaching competitive pressure for lesser players, of which SGI is clearly one of.
Referring to the computer industry as a single industry is analagous to referring to the transporation industry or energy... it doesn't work. SGI and MS are in completely different segments, which are distinct in almost all facets.
I find it interesting and humorous to read the numerous posts and replies on slashdot. Among the many consistent themes are the conspiracies and conspirators that progagate throughout the tech industry. This theme is running on all cylinders with this story, the spectrum covers Belluzzo running SGI in the ground on purpose to a multifaceted attack on Linux by MS.
Before going further, let's agree on one thing: Belluzzo resigned from SGI for a presumably better position elsewhere in the industry... MS according to many reports.
Please take a second to humor me and consider the recent resignation of SGI's Belluzzo from your own career perspective.
1) let's say that you are employed by a company who is struggling to survive, much less take a leadership position, in a stale industry with low margins and fierce competition.
2) you are approached by the leading company in a high profile, media sexy, and wealthy industry.
3) further, you are approached to be the head of a division (essentially a company unto itself) that is struggling to overcome identity and marketing issues, but has the full commitment and resources of its wealthy parent company. In other words, this is a challenge but is doable.
4) you are enticed with cash and stock wealth of much higher certainty than your current position.
What would you do? It's not about loyalty or conspiracy, it's about a fundamental tenet of market economies... freedom to exercise choice
I suppose you couldn't figure out the e-trade page either...
click the speaker icon in the toolbar and check the "mute" box. Is it just me, or does that seem pretty simple?
I am not that familiar with Be, other than by name and market space, but their opening day was very disappointing.
First of all, they hoped to raise $60m and when the issue finally priced, it only raised $36m for them. That sounds like a lot of money, but really is not for a high tech company. To convert that to real terms, a 200 person company can burn $3m a month just on overhead and salaries.
Also, the fact that they couldn't hit their target indicates that they were unconvincing on their roadshow. The roadshow is where price is set based on expected demand from institutional investors. An extreme case the other direction is Ariba, which priced up dramatically in the days leading upto the opening trade. Essentially, it's what the underwriter guarantees to sell their allocation at.
Finally, a 37% rise on the opening day is pitiful... it indicates that the retail investor saw little intrinsic value in the company or it's prospects for the future. Like it or not, a company stock price is a powerful currency used to attract great employees, secure business relationships and make acquisitions.
The changes Baratz hinted to do not appear to include termination of Mozilla, but rather evolving it to something like the Java Community Process.
I would suggest you read the article before adding your 2 cents.
Keep in mind that VC's do not always refer to technology when talking about "scalability". Revenue models are also considered to be scalable or not.
Let me get this straight, your opinion is that the Alpha first began to flounder after Compaq acquired Digital?
900 at this plant, 12,000 since acquiring Digital
bullshit. He said he doesn't intend to do it in the near future. RH would never have scored investments without a forseeable exit strategy, IPO being the most likely.
Let's look at one software vendor whose entire business is providing mission critical business software - SAP. Over half of the new licenses they sell (and it's been this way for about 2 years) are for SAP R/3 on NT with Oracle/NT as the DB.
Most of the other vendors in the high end and mid-market enterprise space report the same trends.
Contrast that to Linux use for mission critical apps, SAP is unable to produce a single customer reference for R/3 on Linux, although the support for Linux has really only been recently provided.
Over time, NT will definitely face stronger competitive forces. Be objective and don't believe the spin just because it's of the flavor you prefer!
Absolutely agree with you on this point.
and I'm sure that everyone on /. is perfectly content to share the pie with Microsoft.
Bill alone did not build Microsoft, the entire ecosystem was responsible. The Linux community is motivated in a similar manner, to grow market share at a rate faster than the rate the market grows at, which implicitly means taking someone else's share away, in this case Microsoft.
I agree that organizational personality eminates from the top, but competitiveness is the nature of business. You can't become a market leader by accident.
Sorry, I seem to miss you insight... he's a great speaker because he bashes microsoft?
sustainable success cannot be achieved by defining what you are as "not microsoft". Focus on the proven benefits that Linux brings to market to meet the requirements of the target.
Hubris can come back to haunt you, just ask Andreeson.
It's through the efforts of "the ABOVE average Joe" who took a chance and went to work for Red Hat, the management team that had a vision AND an ability to execute, and the investors who made it possible through financial support that Red Hat is where it is.
All of the equity is not going to "big corporate players". Through each round of funding the valuation increases and new shares are issued. Investors in previous rounds are typically protected by an "anti-dilution clause" but that comes at a price - they have to invest in the new round pro rata to maintain their share. If previous investors do not invest pro rata, the amount of investor ownership pre money can actually decrease. Of course, there is also the employee option pool and founders stock in addition to outside investors. When the company files their S1, they will carve out a chunk of equity to go to the public markets... and the reality of recent IPO's is that the "float" (stock in the public market) is actually pretty slim. Pre-IPO investors also have the option of selling their stake once the lockup period has expired, increasing the amount of publicly traded shares.
The management, board of directors, investors and potential investors know how much is invested - it's in the capitalization table that is provided with the term sheet, purchase docs and other material.
The investment community doesn't make token investments, we put money to work to earn a significant return on investment. The hard truth is that it's not worth the time to invest for trivial percentages when other opportunities are available - it just takes too much time and effort.
implementation costs typically run 3-4x the software license cost. The problem for app vendors, like SAP, is that Wall St. looks to top line license revenue growth as the benchmark. Service revenue is lower margin than licenses. Furthermore, if you grow service revenue you can create channel conflict with the integrators.
At over US$5 billion in revenue, SAP is the largest enterprise application vendor worldwide. Oracle is larger in total revenue, but their application business is less than $1b. Microsoft is the largest software vendor worldwide in terms of total software sales. IBM's software business is significantly large as well, but you have to break out the numbers to rank it.
for a look at the new UI initiative
1. probably not
2. Through each investment round the valuation of the company grows (hopefully). The previous investors can contribute in subsequent rounds pro rata to preserve their share, or not and have their share diluted. When RH, or any company, files to go public with their S1 you can see who owns what.
3. Yes it is possible, but you have to be able to articulate what you are going to do for the company you are investing in. Companies do not just take money that is offered to them, they have to determine how active the potential investor will be and what value add they will contribute.
3a. Is corporate ownership bad?
3b. Absolutely
Distinguish between proprietary in the sense of someone owning it and proprietary in the sense of someone hiding it.
SAP already ships source code to all of it's customers, along with the ability to use SAP development tools or someone elses to modify it as they wish. If SAP customers wish to share their extensions or modifications, they are fully able to do that.
The fact still remains that someone has to pay for right to benefit from the application. This is not an OS, not a utility, but a mission critical application platform used to run large businesses. That software is used to create efficiencies and ultimately competitive advantages that realize those companies financial benefit.
SAP R/3 on Linux does not require database support for Linux... the app server is on Linux while the db server could be on anything from SQL Server on NT to DB2 on a 390.
I wonder if they considered the possibility that the recording industry isn't delivering the music that 14-24 year olds want.
I know I'm not finding a lot of new music that I like, and I'm in the over 30 crowd which showed growth as a market segment.