01.18.12
Gemini version available ♊︎2012: Post-Novell Careers and Moves
Summary: A look at the movement of staff that left or was pushed out of Novell, along with other news of interest to Novell watchers
NOVELL’S role in the world is declining and so is the news volume about the company. Nevertheless, we have found some noteworthy items that require documenting.
Novell layoffs are listed as one of the major stories of the year 2011, based on the local press in Utah:
Hundreds of people lost their jobs at Novell. Some of them may have been able to snag one of the 100 or so jobs that opened up at Overstock’s new Provo office, which was announced in January.
A primer about the fate of Yahoo! (destroyed by Microsoft) mentions Novell, which also got destroyed by Microsoft:
Sun, Novell and 3Com all lacked experience in both areas. Sun was a hardware company lead by a software executive who had never done a turn around, Novell was a software company run by a series of hardware executives that hadn’t done turn around. I could argue that Palm failed because it was being run by folks who evidently didn’t even know how to run a company, let alone do a turn around.
Novell and IPX are both virtually dead, but this one new article mention these:
AB: That’s why I mentioned the early days of working with Novell and IPX. Even over a piece of standard copper, in those days, they were sending keep-alives every 15, 20 seconds, which really didn’t work terribly well, but it had suddenly gone to wide-area and had a V.56 modem attached to it.
Schmidt is mentioned in relation to Novell over here:
Prior to joining Google, Schmidt served as chairman and CEO of Novell, and before that, he was the chief technology officer of Sun Microsystems.
Sun too died and its patents are now being used against Android/Linux/Google. It is interesting how Sun’s old CEO gets sued by Sun patents (at Google) and also by Apple, where he used to have a chair.
A man who sold his company to Novell gets mentioned here:
Entrepreneur and venture investor Kanwal Rekhi has many accolades to his credit. After selling his start-up firm Excelan, which manufactured smart Ethernet cards, to Novell, he spearheaded the company before returning 100x to his venture investors.
There is more here. About David Skok we learn that:
Skok joined Matrix from SilverStream Software, which he founded in June 1996. Prior to its July 2002 acquisition by Novell, SilverStream was a public company that had reached a revenue run rate in excess of $100M, with approximately 800 employees and offices in more than 20 countries around the world.
Novell swallowed a lot of companies over the years, only to sell them down at the river. A new CFO of a small company turns out to have just come from Novell to manage new funding:
In December 2010, ClickSquared hired a new CFO in Novell veteran Stephen Henkenmeier, joining ClickSquared from M|C Communications, a medical education provider where he was CFO and executive vice president. Prior to M|C, he was vice president of finance at Novell.
Gavin Struthers from Novell is mentioned here:
Struthers worked in various sales and general management roles across Australia, the Middle East, the Mediterranean, and South Africa and served on the management team at Novell in Australia, after moving to the country in 2000. Struthers does have hands-on solution provider experience as he worked for a leading VAR in a sales capacity in his native South Africa.
The former CEO of Novell has a new destination as well, as we mentioned before (he was also mentioned here and here).
Wave Systems Corp. (NASDAQ: WAVX), a leading provider of trusted computing software, today named Robert Frankenberg, 64, to the company’s Board of Directors, increasing Wave’s Board to six members. Mr. Frankenberg’s decades of management experience in the software industry will help guide the company’s business development strategy across key verticals including government, technology, healthcare, financial services, industrial and energy.
Wolfe, whom we also mentioned before, gets mentioned here:
Wolfe is a former president of Novell Americas, an infrastructure software company, and previously worked at IBM. He starts the job Feb. 15 — more than a week after curators are expected to vote on a proposed tuition increase.
Another man with past at Novell is talked about at the Statesman:
Pilot Credentials co-founder Richard Trocino, whose background includes database design at Novell Inc. and Computer Sciences Corp., began developing the pilot software as a contract project for Federal Express in 2001.
And former Novell staff in a new startup venture gets mentioned here. █
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