Summary: Novell's weakness and slowdown as shown by this week's press

WHILE NOVELL is going "downhill" it is also going to the East, notably countries like India. It's a matter of cutting costs, just like at Microsoft.

Novell also moves to Taiwan, one of its very few growth markets which it perceives as an opportunity. According to the following new report from DigiTimes, Novell's business is slowing down even in Taiwan.

Novell estimates its 2009 sales revenues in the Taiwan to increase by about 6% from 2008, marking the first time for the enterprise software and service provider to see on-year growth of less than 10% in the local market, according to Novell Taiwan general manager Barry Chen.

Everywhere one looks, Novell is bleeding to death and with $200,000,000 in losses (2009 fiscal), the future seems uncertain. Novell seems to have found its place in the industry acting as a Microsoft proxy and giving GNU/Linux users "Pledgeware" like Moonlight (also making it a more attractive takeover target for Microsoft, as regulators would spot less competition being eliminated, just converged). Sadly, it's not a joke and Moonlight is poisonous. It's Microsoft's apple to the Free software Snow Whites.

Do the following latest news headlines (ones we have not included yet) make it sound like a gift?

• Microsoft Pledges Not to Sue End Users Developing Third Party Moonlight Distributions



• Microsoft Promises Not To Sue Moonlight 2 Third Party Developers



• Microsoft promises not to sue users of Moonlight

That's like a man proposing to a woman by promising that he would not beat her up. Feel the love in air. Needless to say, promises are not legal contracts and the promise itself is full of more than a dozen legal/technical holes, as was shown last week [1, 2].

Novell is down again and rumours return that it might be merged or acquired (Citrix named as a possibility).

Novell, Inc. (NASDAQ:NOVL), the infrastructure software company had the third largest retreat in the S&P 500 by slumping 2.40% to $4.07.

 

Oracle likes to be in control, as it soon will be with Java, so why not with x64-based server virtualization as well as application streaming and desktop virtualization? Oracle is a good fit for Citrix. But then again, Novell and Citrix could also merge. And as El Reg has pointed out more than once, IBM needs Novell and Citrix as much as Oracle might. Perhaps more.

Other journalists or pundits have already said that Citrix might buy Novell one day (and Microsoft might buy Citrix). Other potential acquirers/mergers for Novell -- as mentioned by the press -- are Dell and McAfee. Microsoft also seems like an option. ⬆