Jeff Jaffe’s Blog

Technology collaboration with Microsoft. Interoperability. Virtualization.

I blog about these topics so often, yet with our series of announcements last week I need to come back to them again.

Joint virtualization solutions

Our partnership with Microsoft has many components beyond business collaboration. On the technology front we have active projects for document and file format compatibility, systems management, identity management, virtualization, multimedia, accessibility, and our joint interoperability lab in Cambridge, MA. Of these, the centerpiece is virtualization: The recognition that customers have mixed environments – some require Linux and Windows servers virtualized on Linux, while others Linux and Windows servers virtualized on Windows – was the primary technology driver to collaborate with Microsoft.

Last week Novell and Microsoft jointly announced that there is a formal offering, SLES optimized and tested as a virtual machine on Hyper-V from Microsoft. The solution is provided by various channel partners, such as Dell

The symmetric piece is for Windows to be a guest on SLES. I recently discussed Microsoft’s Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) in recent post. Last week we also announced that SLES has passed the SVVP tests. We are a first class host, as well.

Discussion.

Here is why these achievements are the primary driver for our collaboration. Virtualization is a critical aspect of IT and the two key operating systems for customers are Windows and Linux. Some customers will host on Windows, others on Linux – depending on a variety of considerations such as history, critical mass, skills, technical preference, and so on. (And some customers will host on other platforms – and Novell works with these partners as well.) Our remarkable partnership with Microsoft commits both companies to be in full support of the customer’s configuration decision. We are optimizing for the customer – not for a technology and not for a vendor strategy. This is as tight a partnership as any customer could wish for.

PlateSpin and Dell

Last week, Dell announced that they will OEM our PlateSpin solution to allow better optimization of virtualization solutions. Novell is strengthening the reach of its virtualization products in customer heterogeneous environments.

Last week we jointly announced with Microsoft a significant incremental investment to in our existing partnership, including Microsoft’s purchase of an additional $100M in certificates that customers can redeem for expanded support from Novell for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. Reception by customers, partners, press, and analysts has been uniformly positive and I don’t have much to add on the announcement itself, other than to state the obvious: this has a dual benefit as we simultaneously help customers with their vital interoperability needs while continuing to promote the growth of Linux and open source.

Novell’s growing relationship with Microsoft goes beyond the commercial piece – providing certificates and SLES to customers. We have a deep technical relationship which assures customers that our systems work well together.

Depth of interoperability

All vendors work with all vendors at some level; customers demand it, and it is the right thing to do. We collaborate in standards forums and open source projects.

But there are variations in depth. Some of the key methods of interaction are:

• One vendor exploits the APIs of a platform vendor and enters the ecosystem of the platform vendor.
• One vendor embeds the technology of another vendor and becomes an OEM partner.
• There is collaboration between two vendors so that their products work well together.
• There is collaboration that goes beyond technical interoperability to joint testing and tuning of the respective products.
• The collaboration goes beyond R&D to joint support in the field, and joint channel or sales development.
• Novell’s aspiration is to have deep interoperability with others.

We are an enterprise software vendor: we only meet enterprise needs with that level of intimacy. We have proceeded with multiple partners, notably hardware OEMs (Dell, HP, IBM, Lenovo) and ISVs.

Depth of partnership with Microsoft

The depth of our partnership with Microsoft is the significant. Some of the key aspects of this partnership are:

• Technical collaboration as part of our original agreement. This was broad covering many areas: documents, directory, management, and virtualization
• A joint laboratory in Cambridge, MA to work on interoperability
• An expansion of this technical collaboration into new areas. This includes the Moonlight project for the Silverlight framework and accessibility.
• Bolstering the technical collaboration by building companion offers. A great example is our Advanced Management Pack for Linux.
  Regular meetings at working levels and executive levels to understand customer problems and explore where additional interoperability is required.

Depth of partnership for virtualization

A great example of this depth is in virtualization. Both Microsoft’s Windows Server and Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Server play multiple roles in virtualization: either may be a virtualization host or a guest.

For Novell’s part, we actively collaborate with multiple partners. In a recent post I discussed substantial activity with Microsoft, VMWare, and Citrix for both classic Novell offers as well as PlateSpin products. Deep collaboration.

In the context of last week’s announcement of an additional investment with Microsoft, it is worthwhile to focus on the unmatched depth in our partnership for virtualization. Customers can count on Linux / Windows interoperability to come from Novell and Microsoft at a level not achievable by other partners. Specifically:

• Our technical collaboration has been underway for close to two years.
  The collaboration is symmetric: we are working on both Windows as a guest on SLES and SLES as a guest on Windows.
• We are focused on tuning and optimization.
• We have a well-established joint laboratory in Cambridge, MA for testing.
• We have been public about our collaboration; we’ve made numerous press announcements, and provided detailed information about the numerous aspects of our technical collaborations.
• Novell participated in the definition of Microsoft’s Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP), and was the first company to announce participation in the program.
• We are both committed to provide support of our mutually-symmetric virtualization offerings.
• There is a very successful joint go-to-market, as evinced by last week’s announcement.
• We build companion products. In a Systems Center shop, there is further leverage when SLES as a guest is managed with Novell’s Advanced Management Pack for Linux

Summary

While there are numerous vendor announcements about interoperability, they vary greatly in the depth of the partnership. There is tangible evidence of a deep commitment of Microsoft and Novell to interoperability and an unprecedented level of collaboration in virtualization.