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Open Source Galvanizing the New Market Economy
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Q: How do you define open source software? Ulander: It's essentially computer software whose source code is available under a copyright license that allows anyone to study, change, improve, redistribute, modify, and build on top of it. The goal of open source software is to embrace a community of developers around the software platform and make it freely available and openly marketable. It's a methodology for software development, but also a route to market. For developers, open source is about participation and collective strength. For users, open source is about vendor neutrality and control over the technology. Q: What are the business benefits to open source? Ulander: Open source allows customers to engage in various technologies early on in an evaluation cycle without cutting a purchase order. They can download it, use it, get their developers on it, and build a proof of concept that helps them decide if they like it. Risk and barriers to entry don't exist. Another benefit of open source for a customer is that there is no lock-in to the company that has delivered the source code. Let's use Linux as an example. People liked Linux because it didn't have the proprietary nature of traditional UNIX flavors. It offered the flexibility to run on multiple hardware technologies, delivered by different vendors. In the late '90s, you either ran Solaris on SPARC, AIX on Power, HP on their custom stuff, or Microsoft on Intel. The desire was to get UNIX-level reliability and capabilities with commodity-based hardware. Linux removed the barriers to entry, enabled more choice, and opened up opportunities for customers. The attractiveness to customers was the ability to leverage commodity technologies from multiple vendors, participate in the community, and take advantage of significant cost savings. The global effect of open sourcing is that barriers are lowered for talking with new developers and customers. We see tremendous potential to expand into markets and regions where legacy infrastructure like wireline telephones don't exist. The global reach of the network enables community participation from all parts of the world. In some places, open source is a mandate. More and more countries are proposing legislation for open source software. Why? Because it allows for economic independence and sovereignty over a part of a nation's infrastructure. This in turn brings a business benefit to Sun, but the big benefit goes back to that barrier to entry. When you eliminate that for developers and sys admins, they have the ability to create proofs-of-concept or next-generation platforms. They get engaged early on with the software, and can move forward to production and engage with Sun on larger commercial terms.
At the end of the day, while companies take general open source to do their test cases and proof of concepts, when they go to market with that platform, whether it be a service or business infrastructure, or their entire solution for the market, they generally want to have commercially-supported, commercially-backed, commercially-indemnified technologies when they go to market. This means they are going to come to Sun for commercial licenses and a partnership. Q: What are the business benefits to a standards-based approach? Ulander: Open standards-based solutions give businesses increased compatibility and the freedom to select the components they want, to build their infrastructure from a wide range of vendors who support the published standard. There is an element of hardware neutrality as well. The widespread adoption of commodity hardware and the massive scale in the datacenter presents a unique opportunity for open source. A move toward standardization permits flexibility and cross-platform interoperability for customers to merge systems and introduce efficiencies in their datacenter. Q: What are the risks associated with open source? Ulander: If open source presents a risk to your business, it's more contingent upon what your business is rather than what open source is. There is a lot of noise in the industry that some open source software contains unlicensed intellectual property. Is that a risk if you are selling or using that software? Perhaps — if you think you will be the target of litigation. For many folks, the answer to that is no. You may want indemnification from your supplier. Consider too the risks of proprietary software — large sunk costs not recouped, dependency on a particular vendor, and a similar theoretical risk with IP. For the producer, the risks might also be that the market you're entering or creating is much more competitive. You have to innovate and stay on top of your game. Look at how Oracle just came into Red Hat's market. To stay competitive, Sun looks to standardize on everything that doesn't differentiate us. That's what our customers want and it brings the right focus to our engineering efforts. Whether you are dealing with proprietary software, free software, or open source software, the risks involved are always a result of the actions taken by the company that has built that technology. If a company is contributing a small percentage and goes out of business, that's a risk. Sun is the largest contributor to our open source platforms and communities. We stand behind them. We are engaged and continue to evolve development to ensure there is continuity, road maps, etc. We're concerned with maintaining a level of quality, a level of customer experience, driving the open standards, minimizing the fragmentation, and making sure that when companies want to leverage open source technology, they have a partner who is strongly committed to it. Q: Why is the network the lifeblood for open sourcing? Ulander: The Internet has enabled incredible access and inter-connectedness across cultures and continents. The power of the Internet has allowed for tremendous uptake in sharing and collaborating, in which individuals do not have to be co-located in order to share work. Individuals are not even required to speak the same language for this sharing to occur. Yes, you can have open sourcing without the network, but the network has definitely fueled the whole revolution around open source technologies. If you're betting against open source, you're betting against the global community. Q: What new markets does open sourcing present? Ulander: Open source is very important in rapidly emerging economies such as China and India, and also in the delivery of public services. As I said earlier, it offers countries sovereignty. Countries that have been dependent on Western suppliers for software and IT can use open source technologies to build the intellectual property of their communities and deepen the local knowledge base. Open source lets these governments take control of their internal affairs and helps to create new market demand and flourishing businesses, along with local job opportunities.
Q: Do people have to choose between commercial software and open source software? Ulander: There is always choice, but people don't have to choose one over the other. They can have a mix of both or use each independently. Just because something is open sourced, doesn't mean it's commercial. Companies that want to deploy on OpenSolaris can do so, and if they need development services or support services, we can help. There are many companies that will never call on Sun because they've engaged in a pure open source model without commercial support. For many large enterprises, however, a key requirement might be systems that are indemnified or have warranties, support, and service level agreements such as is available with Solaris. Q: How do you make money on open-sourced software? Ulander: From an investor perspective, if we don't open source our software, someone else will open source theirs. If we don't open source, our markets will shrink because open source is the trend for governments, businesses, developers, and individuals. Monetization however, has moved from the point of purchase to the point of value that may be realized at the time of deployment, during development or whenever the customer decides to take advantage of the expertise and assurance available. There is a false assumption that support for open source is limited to chat rooms, message boards, and virtual communities. These resources exist, but the benefit is that they exist in addition to the traditional forms of support and services. Sun's job is to embrace open source to proliferate our technology to expand our market penetration. There are six million Solaris downloads, tens of millions of OpenOffice downloads, and big engagement around Java as that becomes an open source platform.
Look at Google, Yahoo!, or YouTube — we don't pay to use those. These are examples of companies that figured out that free access to consumers' eyeballs is worth money to corporations who pay for advertising and such. This just underscores how services and products can be delivered for free and monetized in unique ways to grow the business. Q: What do you think the future holds in this area? Ulander: When I look at market and technology trends, I see both traditional enterprises and Web-based companies with strong requirements around integrating applications into the web. The Web is this new platform where everything has to be simple, cheap, and fast. There is only one development model that encourages this new market economy and that is open source. The traditional UNIXes of the world — HP-UX and AIX — are going away because they haven't become open. Solutions like Windows don't drive interoperability and haven't captured the hearts and minds of the developers building new services. The YouTubes and MySpaces of the world will not be running on these technologies, they will be running on open source. Sun is committed to engaging these new developers by making 100 percent of our software open source. From the kernel, all the way up to the Java layer, to the user identity layer, we are open sourcing everything to encourage, embrace, and engage with next-generation developers and enterprises. About Peder Ulander Prior to rejoining Sun in March 2006, Ulander spent 18 months at MontaVista where he had global responsibility for driving MontaVista's product and marketing strategies. He is recognized as a leader in the Linux and open source industry and has a dynamic reputation and a history of introducing award-winning products in new and emerging markets. | ||||||
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If a rising tide raises all boats, then open sourcing is the next big tide in the world of technology. Sun Executive Boardroom is pleased to present an interview with Senior Vice President of Software Marketing Peder Ulander, who joins us to discuss the myriad of doors that open sourcing opens for developers, enterprises and customers.