Linux Accused of Poor Development
WASHINGTON — The alternative PC operating system Linux has struggled in the marketplace not because of bullying from Microsoft Corp. but because of haphazard development by Linux backers, lawyers for Microsoft said Monday.
Under questioning from Microsoft trial attorney Stephanie Wheeler, Michael Tiemann, chief technology officer of Linux distributor Red Hat Inc., acknowledged in U.S. District Court that his company had spent less money than rivals on research and development.
He also conceded that Red Hat assigned few of its employees to creating new programs for Linux or working with outside developers to write such applications.
During his second day of cross-examination in the landmark Microsoft antitrust case before Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, Tiemann said he could not identify a single Red Hat employee who worked full time on trying to “port,†or translate, applications popular on other PC platforms, such as Microsoft’s Excel spreadsheet program, to the Linux operating system.
He also acknowledged that Red Hat’s research and development spending paled in comparison to rivals such as Microsoft, IBM Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc.
The admission came after Wheeler displayed Red Hat financial reports in the courtroom. The reports showed that the Raleigh, N.C.-based company spent $18.8million on research in fiscal year 2001--a pittance compared with the billions spent by Microsoft, Sun and IBM.
However, Red Hat markets only PC operating system software and, unlike its bigger rivals, does not have to spend money researching such products as keyboards, monitors, game consoles and specialized software products. What’s more, Linux is known as an “open source software,†which is intended to be largely created by unpaid volunteers.
Tiemann was the fifth witness called by California and eight other states seeking stiffer penalties against Microsoft for violating federal antitrust laws by leveraging its Windows software monopoly.
The holdout states have rejected a proposed antitrust settlement reached in November by Microsoft, the Justice Department and nine other states.
Later Monday, a second state witness, Gateway Inc. executive Anthony Fama, said his company hesitated over signing a new licensing agreement with Microsoft for Windows in January because the company felt the contract was more restrictive.
Among other things, Fama said in his written testimony that under the new contract, Microsoft has more leeway to terminate the Windows license agreement than under Gateway’s previous license deals.
