"When troubled Corel Corporation accepted a $135
million investment from Microsoft last October, many called it a
desperate, final act. Standing under the sword of an antitrust
court, Redmond certainly needed all the "competition" it could
find, especially in office applications. Leading Windows
publications were all but sending flowers to Corel's undertaker
after the 15-year-old had bled red ink for years and stumbled,
along with so many others recently, in attempting too early to make
the Linux desktop a standard alternative to Windows.
The revelation that Microsoft's contract with Corel to port .NET
to Linux was secretly extended to include FreeBSD, followed by
announcements of open source .NET projects from Ximian and the Free
Software Foundation, showed that Corel is once again the canny
survivor dancing on the edge. But by showing a profit two quarters
ahead of target, the edge is no longer financial. Moreso than many
vendors, Corel now stands poised to help create the next generation
of standards, and to deliver applications employing them across key
environments.
With the departure of Corel founder Dr. Michael Cowpland, Corel
no longer tilts at the Dragon of Redmond. Reaching into its 15-year
heritage to renew personal relationships with leaders within
Microsoft, Corel's new mission will ultimately impact every one of
us to some degree."
