Open Source To Microsoft's Rescue?

Instead of killing Microsoft (MSFT), open source software could actually make the company stronger. Have I lost my mind with this thesis? Certainly not. Let me explain.

Microsoft's next major Windows Server release, code-named Longhorn, will make-or-break the company's Web 2.0 and enterprise software strategy. The latest test release of Longhorn shipped on April 4, according to ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley. Microsoft expects to ship the final product to business customers late this year.

Now, for some unconventional thinking: For Longhorn to truly succeed, I believe Microsoft will need open source application developers in its corner. Sound impossible? Guess again.

Sure, some members of the mainstream press and even some naive members of the IT trade press believe open source applications only run on Linux. How wrong they are. In reality, major open source developers -- from MySQL to SugarCRM -- have long supported Windows. In fact, about 30 percent of SugarCRM deployments run on Windows- rather than Linux-based systems, according to a spokeswoman for SugarCRM.

But that's not good enough. Microsoft needs to move deeper into the open source community. And it needs to move fast. The day Longhorn is ready to ship, Microsoft needs to make sure MySQL, SugarCRM, Centric CRM and other open source application developers are ready to support the new operating system.

Apparently, Microsoft agrees with me. A trusted source says Microsoft recently attempted to join the Open Solutions Alliance. The organization, which includes about a dozen open source companies, declined to admit Microsoft into the group because members worried about Microsoft's motives.

History suggests that Microsoft will continue reaching out to developers. Flash back to 1993. At the time, Microsoft's Windows NT Advanced Server was a new product desperate for customers. In order to stir demand, Microsoft spent several years recruiting big software developers -- companies like CA Inc. (CA), SAP AG (SAP) and even Oracle Corp. (ORCL) -- to support NT.

Sure, Oracle and other third-party software providers competed fiercely with Microsoft's own email and database groups. But competition in the application arena stirred demand for Windows NT, and ultimately made Microsoft a server powerhouse. If you were a Microsoft shareholder in the 1990s, NT paid you some huge dividends.

Now, Microsoft needs to create an equally rich market for Longhorn applications. If the company doesn't embrace more open source application partners, rival operating systems like Red Hat (RHT) Linux will continue to gain momentum.

Of course, Microsoft's Windows empire was built upon third-party application support. Microsoft somehow forgot that critical rule when it recently shipped Windows Vista for desktops and notebooks. Can anybody name a single great application for Vista? Anyone?

Fact is, there are no killer applications for Vista. For the sake of Microsoft shareholders, customers and partners, let's hope the software giant doesn't make the same mistake with Longhorn.

Comments

[akindman:]

"The organization, which includes about a dozen open source companies, declined to admit Microsoft into the group because members worried about Microsoft's motives."

Yeah, when Microsoft has spent enormous amounts of time and energy attempting to cripple, sabotage, pollute and kill the open source movement -- which it perceives as a significant threat to its business model -- it does sorta call motive into question. In fact... I'm not sure why anyone would seriously believe the effort was sincere and represents a change in Microsoft's thinking.

2007 Apr 11 09:11 AM

[Malkiel:]

Microsoft's relationship with open source projects and willingness to reveal its code doesn't seem to me to be as big a problem as that the core program of windows is bloated and based upon insecure premises and needs to be reconstructed from the ground up on a different core, or perhaps cleverly pruned and maintained so it doesn't intrude on the users and make unreasonable hardware demands. In any event, someone at Microsoft needs to be clever and powerful enough to see that change is needed at this critical juncture...

2007 Apr 11 12:54 PM

[jeff.rollin:]

"History suggests that Microsoft will continue reaching out to [open source] developers".

In fact it suggests the exact opposite. In every sphere in which Microsoft has set its sights, it has used and abused its monopoly position and its knowledge of Windows to out-manoeuvre all its competitors. It didn't put compression into Windows to help Winzip, or bundle Word with computers to help WordPerfect. The only reason companies like Adobe now produce products like Photoshop for Windows is because it looked at one time as if Macs were going to flushed down the plughole, with not a little help from Apple.

MS's "attempts to join the Open Source Alliance" are similar. In the same way that it has publicly come out in support of "differing office formats" but still attempted to wangle the OSI approval process in its favour, so it will be using its membership of the OSA to undermine that organization's goals.

In that regard, Free and Open Source software represent the single largest threat to Microsoft's software monopoly since...I don't know when. FOSS inhibits a company's ability to make a monopoly, and Microsoft with 90% of desktop marketshare can only go down. Like DEC before it (a comparison which MS's own Bill Gates himself has made) it will go on trying to push its own architecture in the face of increased competition from outsiders, because whilst doing so condemns it to a slow death, the only alternative is to move into the FOSS arena and start from nothing.

2007 Apr 12 01:54 PM