This ain’t the latest update on the Saddam-US situation. The food for
thought here is the open source software tussle between Microsoft and Linux,
which has now spilled over onto Indian shores. And Bill Gates seem to be trying
all the tricks of the trade to oust Linux, while still trying cling onto his
market share in India.
Freebies ahoy
Government-owned enterprises increasingly prefer open source software like
Linux compared with packaged software from commercial vendors. The reason for
the recent rise in the adoption rate of open source software is rising concerns
about security, cost and control among buyers. Computers are not only used for
computing, but for communication as well and it is becoming difficult to protect
sensitive data in a networked world. Most of the operating systems sold by
vendors have obvious security flaws in them that make the networks in these
organizations open to hackers. Though vendors like Microsoft update the fixes to
cover security flaws regularly, the more important part is that the users of
these operating systems do not have any control over making any changes, as the
source code is proprietary. Whereas in open source, the code is available to the
public to use and make changes. Linux is just one of the softwares available in
open source.
It is not that the cost of an open source software is zero. Only the package
is free. Installation, implementation, and maintenance costs money. Third party
service providers provide all these services around Linux. Therefore, open
source software can be freely downloaded from the Internet but to install and
run it support is needed.
The battleground
India is an important market for Microsoft given that last year alone the
country purchased packaged software worth $409 million–of which 80% were
Microsoft products. Also the packaged software market grew by 37% in India in
2001. Growth rates are expected to continue at this rate for a few years to
come. Estimates put the present size of India’s developer population at
anywhere between 450,000 and 600,000. That’s about 10% of the world’s
developer population. By end-2002, India will probably have more developers than
any country in the world. And with the government, which is the largest and
fastest adopter, making a conscious move towards Linux, Bill Gates sure has
reason to lose sleep.
Till now India has been a safe haven for Microsoft. But this was till the
tech downturn unfolded and there was a major slashing of IT spends by corporate
houses. Public perception that using open source technologies reduce the cost of
technology deployments convinced companies across the world to seriously
consider cheaper alternatives.
In India, manufacturing and telecom companies are looking at some form of
Linux, though banking firms are staying away at the moment. And the reasons for
going the Linux way is that it decreases their dependence on the hardware
vendor, the companies can negotiate with multiple vendors and hence get better
deals, it lowers the total cost of ownership and offers flexibility. The irony
according to Microsoft is that choosing Linux may prove more expensive in the
long run.
Factually speaking
The most fundamental problem with Linux is that it is an amorphous entity
around which robust business models are yet to evolve. Also,in spite of a major
drive to promote the acceptance of Linux in India, the lack of a clear-cut
policy has stalled its growth.
What happened with Linux can be likened to the ‘roaches-under-the-board
theory’. Microsoft never saw it as a potential threat to its existence. But
neglecting this software has proven costly and the behemoth needs to state its
case soon enough or the carpet will be pulled from under Gates’ legs.
Dhanya Krishnakumar In New Delhi