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

To: Pruguy who wrote (22966)	7/5/1998 1:35:00 PM
From: DJBEINO	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42771

Novell Friends, Foes Drag It Into Lawsuits BY STEVEN OBERBECK THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE Everyone, it seems, including competitors both friend and foe, want a peek inside the walls of Novell Inc. Sun Microsystems is one. The Palo Alto, Calif., company has worked extensively with Novell, a computer networking company based in Provo, to develop network uses for its JAVA programming language. But that has not stopped it from trying to drag Novell into its lawsuit with Microsoft. Business, after all, is business. And it does not matter whether the dealings are in the marketplace or the courtroom. As part of its attempt to stop Microsoft from altering its Java language to work best on Windows operating systems, Sun says it needs to find out what kind of deals Microsoft has struck with Novell concerning JAVA uses. Naturally, Novell is resisting, saying Sun ought to get such information from Microsoft. ''Millions of pages might have to be reviewed in order to locate responsive documents,'' Novell said in a recent attempt to quash Sun's subpoena. Novell said it will provide the papers with no objection if Sun pays all costs. Microsoft, often referred to as the software industry's 800-pound gorilla, also wants a look inside Novell. The company based in Redmond, Wash., whose operating systems run 90 percent of the world's personal computers, is facing lawsuits by the U.S. Justice Department and a host of states, including Utah, that claim it unfairly uses its market dominance to stifle competition. So what does Microsoft do? It says it really needs to know what Novell's plans are for adapting its networking programs to better run with the Internet. Presumably, Microsoft will use the information to argue there really is competition in the world. Of course, Novell is bristling over the request. What Microsoft is really trying to do, Novell contends, is get a look at trade secrets, confidential research and business plans that would give it a greater competitive advantage. ''Basically, Sun is asking for the past and Microsoft wants to see the future,'' says Salt Lake attorney Thomas Karrenberg, who is representing Novell. Just about all high-tech companies have trade secrets they would rather not reveal, says Peter Genereaux of the Utah Information Technology Association. ''A small company can have secrets as important to them as those at a big company,'' says Genereaux. Still, he says it is probably a lot more important to Utah's economy that Novell be able to keep its confidential information under wraps than a small start-up company. sltrib.com