At the start of the LinuxWorld Expo in New York this week, Silicon Graphics
made a dramatic commitment to the upstart Linux operating system, while IBM
added to its already strong endorsement of the open source software as a viable
corporate solution by announcing that its line of Network Station thin client
computer terminals can now run Linux and Linux applications residing on powerful
network servers.
Silicon Graphics said it has re-assigned some 300 employees to support the
company's new Linux-based products and support services. SG will open 23 Linux
service centers around the world offer classes on using Linux and offer a range
of Intel processor-based servers from a basic $4,600 Internet server to a
$125,000 machine with 32 processors to manage a wide variety of corporate tasks
from e-mail, file serving, Web hosting, video streaming and data management.
"Nobody else is as committed to Linux as we are. If you look at what
other companies are doing, they plan to run Unix on Intel or NT on Intel. Intel
and Linux is our strategic future," said Jan Silverman, marketing vice
president of Silicon Graphics. Analysts, however, said SG is late entering the
Linux space and will be competing with IBM, Dell and Compaq who declared their
support early on. And until the Linux OS become more robust in large enterprise
applications, the commitment also appears a bit risky.
Unlike other companies who have make a business out of the free Linux OS by
bundling it with hardware or adding new features to the OS itself, SG wants to
offer "plug-and-play" solutions to help transform Linux from a
hobbyist/small business OS to a mainstream corporate networking operating
system. "A lot of companies are interested in Linux because it provides a
very cost-effective solution and because they can modify it to meet their
specific needs. You can't do that with Solaris or NT. But they don't want to
spend time and effort developing, installing and maintaining a Linux solution.
So we'll do that for them," Silverman said.
Meanwhile, IBM said it has posted details on configuring the Network Station
servers and clients for Linux. "We are definitely embracing Linux where it
makes sense. We're working with the Linux community to make it a better
operating system," said Irving Wladawsky-Berger, vice president of
technology and strategy for IBM's enterprise systems unit.
Besides the Network Station Series 2200 and 2800, IBM previously made Linux
available for its ThinkPad notebooks, IntelliStation workstations and Netfinity
PC servers. Additional announcements are expected in the coming months as IBM
has pledged to support Linux for all of its server lines. IBM also announced
last week that is has made key Java software components the company has
developed for its own computers to leading distributors of Linux, including Red
Hat, Caldera and TurboLinux.
Both Silicon Graphics and IBM are using Linux to help the company fight
business battles on two fronts; Microsoft and its Windows NT network OS on one
and Sun Microsystems and its Solaris OS on the other. IBM hope its support will
help accelerate the ability of Linux to establish itself as a third option for
running computer networks, while struggling Silicon Graphics hopes the low-cost
solution of the Linux OS platform will give the company a competitive edge over
Sun, HP and other competitors in the Unix market.
With its low-cost open-source distribution system, Linux is expected to
compete effectively with Windows NT/2000 in the market for small and mid-size
companies, while Sun appears to have a solid position against either in the
higher enterprise and Internet markets. "For the Internet space, Linux is
the direction of the market," said Wladawsky-Berger. "We see Linux
doing for applications what the Internet did for networking. And Linux is very
popular around the world, so we can go hire programmers in India, Europe or
China."
But even Wladawsky-Berger conceeded that for now, the small and mid-size
market is where Linux will have the bulk of its impact. "The software
system will require a lot of work before it can be made ready to handle
industrial-strength business tasks. We cannot look out ten years to see if Linux
will develop into the dominant operating system for heavier operations, but we
are positioning well if it does."