CPQ takes equity stake in Red Hat software
March 9, 1999 08:03 AM
DURHAM, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 9, 1999--
Compaq, IBM, Novell and Oracle Take Equity Positions in Leading Linux Software
Builder to Help Bring Powerful Open Source Operating System to Their Customers
Red Hat(R) Software, Inc., the leading builder of the Linux operating system,
announced today that it has accepted offers of equity investments from Compaq,
International Business Machines (IBM), Novell and Oracle Corporation. These industry
leaders will all take minority equity positions in Red Hat. The financial terms were not
disclosed for any of these relationships by Red Hat or its partners.
The announcement follows months of tremendous momentum for privately-held Red
Hat, including equity investments from Intel, Netscape and venture capital firms
Greylock and Benchmark Partners in September 1998.
"Red Hat chose Compaq, IBM, Novell and Oracle as equity partners because of their
leadership positions in the computing industry. Their support of Red Hat is a broad
endorsement of the Open Source Software model that is changing the entire software
industry and driving the rapid adoption and success of Linux," said Robert F. Young,
co-founder and CEO of Red Hat Software. "The support of a such a stellar group of
leaders creates even more momentum for the Open Source Software movement and
for Linux as a powerful, reliable, cost-effective and safe choice for any computing
environment."
More than 10 million users currently run the Linux operating system. According to IDC
Research, Linux was the fastest-growing server operating environment in 1998,
capturing more than 17 percent of all server operating system shipments. Red Hat
Software builds, maintains and provides technical support for the Official Red Hat
Linux operating system. Linux runs on Intel, Alpha and Sun SPARC platforms and will
soon run on PowerPC systems.
Today's announcement of equity funding by the leaders of the computing industry
caps a month of major announcements from Red Hat. Hewlett-Packard, Compaq, Dell
and IBM each announced plans to support Red Hat Linux on a variety of server and
workstation systems. At last week's LinuxWorld Expo, Red Hat unveiled a new web
portal (www.redhat.com) designed to be the primary web destination for anyone
interested in Linux news, support, products and community information. |
