Novell Agrees to be Acquired by AttachMate; Sells Some IP to a MS-Organized Consortium

“Novell has sold itself to Attachmate Corporation. There is a
side deal selling “certain intellectual property assets” to CPTN
Holdings LLC, “a consortium of technology companies organized by
Microsoft”. SUSE goes to Attachmate, I gather, and will be a
separate unit, so what goes to Microsoft’s consortium?

“No doubt we’ll find out in time. It is being reported that what
it will get is 882 patents. Blech. But keep in mind that the
WordPerfect litigation could be in this picture, and I wonder if
this could be a kind of deal to tactfully settle it out, with
Microsoft paying to end it this way? Nevertheless, selling any
patents to Microsoft is like selling your baby to a pedaphile in
the limited sense that you can reasonably predict what it will do
with the acquisition.

“Novell’s CEO is telling “valued customers” in an email that
it’s a merger agreement, that Novell believes “the transaction is
great news for our customers,” that all contracts will be honored,
and that the IP sale to Linux’s sworn enemy “will not impact
customers”, whatever that means.”

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