05.01.07
Posted in Finance, Novell, Rumour at 11:32 am by Shane Coyle
An interesting twist appears to have emerged from Novell’s (and many other companies, to be fair) backdating options scandals, which could make these companies vulnerable to takeover.
The Financial Times has come up with a novel assessment of the stock options scandal. It may open the door to takeover bids at as many as 42 companies. The primary leverage is that investors can ask the courts to call an annual meeting in many states when the company has not held one for over 13 months. Companies involved in the options scandal cannot send out proxies for these meetings because they do not have the required financial statements to go along.
Some fairly large companies, including McAfee (NYSE: MFE) and Novell (Nasdaq: NOVL) are in the pool of firms with annual meeting problems.
Those darn SEC requirements that Justin Steinman referred to just a few days ago just keep coming up for Novell. So, if Novell is indeed in this vulnerable position – are they a desirable takeover target?
Permalink
Send this to a friend
Posted in Novell at 10:50 am by Shane Coyle
Matt Asay reports on the continued Exodus of talent from Novell, the latest being Walter Knapp.
While John Dragoon (a generally likable and great guy) attempts to confuse the issue as to why people are annoyed with the Microsoft/Novell pact (Hint: John, it’s not an interoperability thing, it’s a patent thing), the Novell exodus continues…with Walter Knapp, former effective head of the Novell’s Linux Impact Team, is leaving Novell’s Waltham headquarters for other work.
Permalink
Send this to a friend
Posted in GNU/Linux, Marketing, Novell, Red Hat at 8:27 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
I must admit that I got a little chuckle reading a blog post from Novell’s PR department. Novell is yet to show that the deal with Microsoft was actually fruitful in one way or another. The company seems determined to suggest that other distributors are longing for a bond with Microsoft when the matter of fact is that Novell just hurts everybody else rather than actually elevate itself. It is akin to destroying your rivals rather than improving your own products. Sounds familiar? Well, Novell seems to resemble its new partner more and more each day. Ridicule of Linux products from rivals seems acceptable, even though those ‘rivals’ work towards the same goal, which is to make Linux widespread. After all, the companies share source code and thrive in such achievements. Matt Asay, who used to work at Novell, has said several times — you can do better, Novell.
The post from Novell follows, with just a fragment quoted.
[Chief Marketing Officer for Novell:] For months now I’ve been biting my tongue and sitting on the sidelines as comment after comment from executives at Red Hat go unchallenged about Novell, our Linux business and our partnership with Microsoft. In truth, you won’t hear anything emanating from Red Hat about the value of interoperable Linux and Windows solutions. No, it’s far easier to patronize Novell, question our motivations and intentions, and challenge the integrity of our company.
This is baffling. Is Novell competing with Red Hat on moral grounds here? Hasn’t Novell admitted that its deal with Microsoft was a selfish act? Why yes it has!
Update: there is more coverage of the hostile exchnage of blows at CRN. Given context, I can understand why Novell is angry.
Permalink
Send this to a friend
Posted in Hardware, Novell, Ubuntu at 2:35 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Recently, Dell promised to preinstall Linux on desktops and laptops. Several speculations revolved around Red Hat and Ubuntu Linux while many people suggested that Novell’s SLED was “enterprise ready”. Despite all of this, Novell seems very unlikely to get love from Michael Dell. The following reveals a lot.
According to our sources, Ubuntu will be released on a Dell e-series “Essential” Dimension desktop, an XPS desktop, and an e-series Inspiron laptop.
The e-series systems are budget-priced PCs that start at $408 without a monitor. The base systems come with 512MB of RAM and a 160GB SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) hard drive. It appears that Dell will only be offering Ubuntu on one of the two systems in this family. The E521 is powered by an AMD Sempron 3400+ chip and uses a NVIDIA GeForce 6150 LE Integrated Graphics GPU (graphics processor unit) for graphics. The alternative, the E520, uses an Intel 2.8GHz Celeron D processor.
Permalink
Send this to a friend
Content is available under CC-BY-SA