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Technology Stocks : Novell (NOVL) dirt cheap, good buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ToySoldier who wrote (30249)	2/11/2000 7:16:00 PM
From: p friend	Respond to of 42771

News re iChain dailynews.yahoo.com Novell Morphs Again By Deborah Gage, Sm@rt Reseller Schmidt's out of day-to-day management, and a hosting bid is on the horizon. Just when you thought you understood Novell's latest positioning, the company makes another move. Novell's used the launch of iChain at its headquarters in San Jose this week to mark its makeover into a provider of infrastructure for e-business. In fact, iChain is Novell's first official foray into the hosting business. Novell will release more details about iChain--including how the framework integrates into legacy systems--at its BrainShare conference the end of March. At that time, Novell also is expected to offer more details on how it will use iChain to attack the application-service-provider market. Novell's partners say it still has a ways to go. iChain--which Novell calls "a framework for managing relationships" among companies, suppliers, and partners--is not available for 60 days and only will be released then to a select group of partners who can help Novell work out the remaining technical and business issues. iChain relies on the eDirectory (Novell Directory Services 8) technology that Novell launched at fall COMDEX. Schmidt As Full-Time Visionary Novell also continues to reorganize itself. Although Eric Schmidt remains Novell's president and CEO, he has turned most day-to-day management over to Stewart Nelson, a six-year Novell veteran who is now overseeing sales, services, marketing and product management. Schmidt continues to oversee chief financial officer Dennis Raney and to chair an operating committee that replaces Novell's former executive committee. According to a memo that Schmidt sent out internally this week, a copy of which was examined by Sm@rt Reseller, the new committee includes four senior VP, plus Raney. The four VPs are Ron Heinz, senior VP of worldwide sales; Rich Nortz, senior VP of services; Steve Adams, senior VP worldwide marketing; and Dave Shirk, senior VP product management. Novell also is remaking its channel, creating a new organization and programs for current partners who want to use iChain and other products "outside the firewall." That number is so far tiny compared to the 25,000 partners Novell claims worldwide. But channels director Bill Wall says the requirements for Novell's emerging channel partners are so different that only a new organization will suffice. The 'Glue' For Sticky Services Still, even those partners who have not yet seen much of iChain say it has the potential to open vast new markets for Novell. Valerie Perlowitz, CEO of Novell Platinum partner Reliable Integration Services, calls iChain "the glue" for applications that "dynamically present data to people on a need-to-know basis." iChain offers common security, authentication and management, and includes a commerce engine that integrates with billing and payment services. "Everybody is looking at Web-enabling themselves without looking at the infrastructure, and we had not seen anything we were comfortable recommending. You don't want some outside vendor ordering [from your Web site and] getting access to your accounting data," says Perlowitz. Jo McCausland, who directs Novell's systems integrator and consultant alliances, says Novell will partner with service providers to host iChain and will sell iChain and other products to companies that want to become application service providers themselves. Novell expects to earn revenue from transactions as well as software sales. McCausland will seek partnerships with Web integrators such as Scient and Viant. Novell did announce nearer-term products. ZenWorks for servers ships in March and allows administrators to manage servers across networks and to set and manage policies for distributing content. ZenWorks for Networks ships now--Perot Systems announced a practice around it. The software manages quality of service on all Layer-3 devices from Cisco and other network providers and uses eDirectory to create usage policies. But partners say Novell must get its marketing act together. Part of Schmidt's latest reorganization was to appoint a senior VP of marketing, Adams, following recent executive departures. See this story in context on ZDNN's Page One Section.