Sun says Microsoft pact not a blow to standards

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Sun tried repeatedly to work with MS ... its MS caving in!

it appears that you do indeed follow the industry news and so you know that the news is, Sun's in DEEP trouble. Yes I know about their war chest, but I also see the P&L sheet for the last 10 consecutive quarters. No company (for-profit) can live like that and no stockholder is going to be happy about it. And that is who is calling a truce to the Scott and Bill show.

Rember, both Sun and MS said this "settlement" goes beyond what is available under the COA ordered licensing program. We have no knowlege how far the cross-licensing will go but I'm positive that Sun brings more to the R&D table than MS does. MS brings a channel but what MS technology does Sun really need? Everything MS is willing to license is already available (like 85% anyway) as D.M. points out.

If you have ever seen or heard Scott talk about MS, you KNOW he isn't the one that called a truce.

Did you know it was Gates who started the war by flat out refusing to support Sun's platform even thouh it had more graphical seats at more lucrative customers than anything else? Scott kissed Gates petunias for years before Windows was a success. As a matter of fact, quite alot of Sun exec's invested in MS at the IPO and they had alot of respect for what later became "the beast". Gates repeatedly promised to port Office to SPARC and repeatedly reneged on his promise. Gates said MS would support SPARCstation if it hit 100,000 seats. When Scott called him he said he meant 250,000. Then it was 500,000 then it was 1,000,000 seats. Sun tried for years to work with MS, remember MS started the war with MOTIF to block ISV's from taking up Sun's superior GUI technology. Sun even tried to license Apple's GUI but they refused (but later moved it to *NIX in OSX). That early history of Sun's repeated attempts to team up with both Apple and MS is usually not mentioned in the "history". Sun invented networked, low cost, graphical desktops ... where do you think MS got the idea? MS was actually one of Sun's biggest customers.

I also believe it is the reason behind the management changes which Scott said was not needed and would not happen. (COO position)

Either that or Schwartz's strategy to move toward SW subscription for SW which was available for free - sell Sun's strongest asset its people! Sun has always led by the trust customers had in its people's ability to "punch above its weight class". Perhaps the increasing take up rate for Java Desktop and Orion's potential as the hetrogenous Enterprise management layer proved to compelling to ignore? Sun has repeatedly refocused itself - give 'em credit - they've done that for over 20 years.

Posted by: oldskool   Posted on: 04/06/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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