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by James Avery.
Original Post: My Thoughts on Sun and Microsoft
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Before I go jump on a plane I wanted to talk about the recent Sun and Microsoft love fest. This is definitely surprising, and I am sure a decent number of people thought it was some sort of late April Fools joke. Here is how I see it. Basically Sun does not want to fade away and become irrelevant, and Microsoft does not want IBM to get Java. IBM is taking Sun's market share, they are embracing open source and Java as a way to sell linux servers. (You know, IBM has always loved selling the hardware).
IBM is challenging both Sun and Microsoft. They are directly challenging Microsoft by pushing Linux, and they are directly opposing Sun by pushing cheap x86 Intel boxes instead of Suns servers. I think Sun and Microsoft both realized that there were two possibly paths:
1) Sun continues to lose money, eventually they either open source Java and IBM takes it or they are acquired by some other company. IBM needs a reliable development platform to push with there hardware, they need Java.
2) Microsoft and Sun jump in bed together. Microsoft gets an assurance that IBM will not have ownership over Java, as well as reducing the number of open lawsuits. Sun gets closure on there expensive lawsuits and gets to redefine there company. No longer do they have to play that role of the Anti-MS, they can return to focusing on making money and innovating. Sun also gets a little pocket change to help out that bottom line. $2 billion is really nothing to Microsoft, BillG probably made that much by the stock jump from the announcement.
Number 2 is the obvious choice. I think the only question now is if Sun will gradually realign themselves as anti-Microsoft, like Apple has over the years.
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