Novell had no major products to unveil, so it just issued a vague press release about a vision it has.
Novell today announced an integrated vision for the future of the data center and a portfolio of integrated products designed to help customers increase agility while reducing cost, complexity and risk. The Service-Driven Data Center provides solutions to build, manage and measure the next generation data center so IT executives can deliver the business services that end users need through a flexible, automated and cost-effective infrastructure. Only Novell has the unique combination of technology-agnostic, interoperable and easy-to-use solutions that let customers maximize the utilization of their IT assets within a secure and compliant framework whether customers are running a server farm, building an internal cloud, or using an external cloud.
There was no coverage about this in the media, just copies of the press release, e.g. here and here.
Looking elsewhere, we found that the SCO trial moves forward (or almost nowhere).
Novell has responded [PDF] to SCO's Objections to Novell's Bill of Costs, submitted as the prevailing party in SCO v. Novell.
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SCO *didn't* contest, Novell points out, most of the bill of costs, and it didn't contest that each of the depositions for which Novell seeks to recover costs were "reasonably necessary to the litigation of the case", which is the standard.
Novell has filed its brief in the appeal of SCO v. Novell. It's 87 pages, so I haven't read it yet myself. I'll swing back by after I read it. But the quick look at the index and the closing words indicates Novell is asking the court to affirm the lower court: "For all the above reasons, the district court judgment should be affirmed." That's on page 67 of the filing, which is page 81 of the PDF. Keep that disparity in mind when you look up page numbers in the opening index. For example, the Summary of Argument is page 21 of the filing, but you'll find it on page 35 of the PDF.
The 2.4 kernel is exactly what the SCO litigation was supposedly about. We're talking the GPL here, though, so I can't help but ask another natural question. Did SCO carefully provide the source for all the Linux code it distributed, including with Open UNIX 8 (and later Unixware with the LKP)?
Novell on April 6 announced several enhancements to its solution suite for endpoint management designed to help customers maximize their investments in the ZENworks product line.
Virtualisation
The Var Guy, blinded by his support of Novell, fails to see that Novell's investment in PlateSpin turned out rather badly.
As The VAR Guy watched the PlateSpin demonstrations, Novell’s strategy finally became clear. First, get customers addicted to PlateSpin as a key tool for server consolidation and virtualization efforts that cut data center costs. Second, make sure SUSE Linux is a potential destination platform for the consolidation projects.
Novell’s Business Service Management strategy, in stark contrast, seems to be a work in progress. Yes, BSM helps Novell customers to further improve system up-time. But Novell’s efforts to cross-train SUSE Linux partners on Business Service Management are just starting.
BlackBerry Enterprise Server is designed for organisations that manage their own email servers. The BlackBerry Enterprise Server software tightly integrates with IBM€® Lotus€® Domino€®, Microsoft€® Exchange and Novell€® GroupWise€® and offers advanced security features and IT policy controls to enable secure, push-based wireless access to email and other corporate data.
Novell's GroupWise might play nice with the Palm Pre thanks to this product.
"We look forward to Palm announcing a Synergy SDK to allow CompanionLink to synchronize Outlook, Lotus Notes, ACT! by Sage, Outlook Business Contact Manager, and Novell GroupWise data directly to the Palm Pre. Until that time, our currently available products will support the early adopters of the Palm Pre..."
One of Google's biggest global GMail deals was a $10million project with Telstra and SMS Technology to supply the NSW Education Department with 1.5 million accounts.
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Late last year staff continued to use the Novell GroupWise platform for email.
The company has an extensive communications network connecting thousands of professionals with clients and partners. It uses Novell's Groupwise collaboration suite, and has extremely high mail volumes: in the construction side of the business alone over 50 000 e-mails are exchanged every day.
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The Aveng implementation involved integrating Mimecast with the Novell NetWare environment. Mimecast's core infrastructure is based on its own carrier-class technology platform, which in turn is based on open industry standards and with powerful Web-based interfaces. Users see no change to how they access e-mail as messages are passed from the Mimecast servers (which do scanning and archival) to Aveng's GroupWise servers and then on to the clients. Users access the mail archives through the Web console, which provides virtually instant response times on searches.
Fitzpatrick said Microsoft has pushed DAS as his company looks to migrate to Exchange from Novell GroupWise email, but he's holding back. "I don't want to have the hassle with it," he said. "I'm also investigating hosted Exchange for that reason."
This report also shows up right here under a different headline.
While the company is credited for coining the term BSM, BMC is not alone in the market. Companies such as Novell (which acquired Managed Objects), ManageEngine and Zyrion also develop BSM software applications.
Generall speaking, I don’t hear much about Novell in the MSP market. But I think BSM software could emerge as a niche solution for larger MSPs that need to manage SLAs.
Jay Roxe, director of product marketing at Novell (www.novell.com), agrees that tough times are increasing the likelihood of internal and external threats and suggests using identity management as a possible solution with ROI potential.
“Identity management is an area where IT security pros can demonstrate return on investment while also addressing major security concerns,” says Roxe, who adds that layoffs can be especially problematic. “Having automatic systems in place that can immediately deactivate an employee’s access to valuable information on a company’s systems is important.”
Roxe also recommends consolidating duplicate, often obsolete systems to save operational costs and streamline management processes. He also advises assessing employee role profiles and ensuring that no one individual has too much access. He cites an example of a single employee who can issue purchase orders and approve payments as a potential fraud risk. In these cases, compliance management systems can automatically enforce IT policies that manual processes would have difficulty tracking.
David Bradford was mentioned in a lot of places because his company received funding, which is becoming a rare occasion in this economy. As the press release states (also here), Bradford has roots in Novell:
In preparation for Series B funding, industry veteran and respected executive David Bradford has taken the helm. Mr. Bradford brings 30 years of experience to Fusion-io, including 15 years at the networking software giant Novell, Inc. As a senior Novell executive, he helped lead the company from startup status through a series of acquisitions, public offerings and global business development activities to its position as a multi-billion dollar corporation. During his last three years at Novell, he reported directly to the CEO, Eric Schmidt.
"I am delighted to hear that David Bradford has been appointed CEO of Fusion-io," said Dr. Schmidt, now the CEO of Google. "I have great confidence in his ability to lead this innovative company."
The three-year-old Salt Lake City company said Tuesday that it has raised $47.5 million in funding and named former Novell executive David Bradford as CEO.
Enterprise storage company Fusion-io said Tuesday that it has raised $47.5 million in venture capital and named David Bradford, a former Novell executive, as CEO.
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As for the new CEO, Fusion-io moved to add a CEO as it prepped for its latest round of financing. For the last decade, Bradford served on the board of directors of Pervasive Software. Prior to that, Bradford worked as senior vice president and general counsel at Novell for 15 years.
New CEO Bradford is a 30-year veteran of the tech industry, including 15 years at networking company Novell, Fusion-io said. As a senior executive, he led Novell from startup status through a series of acquisitions, public offerings, and global business development. During his last three years at Novell, Bradford reported directly to chief executive Eric Schmidt, who is now CEO of Google.
In a tribute to Bradford's networking skills and contact book he's tapped Google CEO Eric Schmidt, a previous boss at Novell, where he worked for 15 years, to provide a supportive quote: "I am delighted to hear that David Bradford has been appointed CEO of Fusion-io. I have great confidence in his ability to lead this innovative company."
The expansion into network storage takes place just as Fusion-io has signed on former Novell executive David Bradford as its CEO. Besides his experience in networking software, Bradford was also instrumental in bringing Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak into the company as a chief scientist to help guide the storage producer's research.
I just received a press release saying that Fusion-io has just landed a big Series B round of funding: $47.5 million from LightSpeed Venture Partners, and that it named David Bradford, a former senior VP and general counsel at Novell as its new CEO. Dell, New Enterprise Ventures and Sumitomo Ventures also participated in the investment.
Fusion-io's new CEO, Bradford, was the senior vice president and general counsel at Novell from 1985 to 2000, and has held a number of posts over the past decade in the legal world and at several Web 2.0 and social networking companies. Bradford currently serves on the board of directors for Pervasive Software, a database management vendor.
The company’s announcement notes that in Bradford’s last three years at Novell, he reported directly to then-chief executive Eric Schmidt (now CEO of Google). Not that Salt Lake City-based Fusion-io really needs to play a “six degrees of separation” game to find connections to tech superstardom — Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak recently joined as chief scientist.
This growth has propelled Eric from his prior status as a little-known CEO of a technology also-ran (Novell) to one of the world's most powerful and richest men. He is also now widely regarded as one of the world's most talented chief executives.
Wireless broadband solution company Xiocom Wireless has appointed Dell executive Steve Erdman as president. Erdman, who has 22 years of experience in technology sales, marketing and global business management, will oversee day-to-day operations and business and market development. He was most recently vice president of channels and alliances at infrastructure software provider Novell.
TriSano was developed by the Collaborative Software Initiative, a Portland-based company, with financial backing from Novell. It is open-source software, meaning it was free for the state to acquire and available for anyone to download and change as they see fit.
The workshop will be held in the Mountainview Conference Room at the Novell Campus, in Provo, Utah, on April 29, 2009, from 8:00-11:00 a.m. Attendees that register by April 17th will receive a free website analysis upon registration. For more information, including registration, please visit http://www.seo.com/registration.
As currently planned, Utah Valley University will serve as the northernmost terminal and the Novell Campus as the southernmost, with Brigham Young University as a major stop in the middle.
At this point it would be rather foolish to assume that IBM will let Red Hat just "do its own thing" or maintain its corporate culture, identity, projects etc.
