[ Thanks to Kelly
McNeill for this link. ]
“Between its record-breaking IPO, its new position as the No. 2
provider of Linux servers in the U.S. (behind Compaq), and its four
successive quarters of incredible sales growth, VA Linux might be
content to look ahead at clear sailing and a strong path to
profitability in the near future. But in this industry, to sit
still is to slip behind, and VA surely knows that as well as anyone
else.”
“The company has a great portfolio of strengths: the combination
of Linux hardware and software expertise, strong brand recognition,
a growing professional services arm, and a number of key Web
properties in the form of Andover.net and the OSDN. But the firm’s
success and diversification have placed it in competition with a
number of established and well-funded competitors from HP, IBM and
Sun to EMC and Network Appliance in the storage field. VA Linux’s
potential customers span an even larger range, from large
corporations to Net startups, and from long-time Linux gurus to
organizations that remain skeptical of the operating system. Thus,
the company has to ask itself a very simple question: What
strategies will allow VA Linux to differentiate itself in the long
run and to broaden its appeal beyond the current customer
base?”
“The answer, and VA’s philosophy for the future, should be
simple: All servers are appliances, and all sales are custom.
When I call a server an appliance, I mean that its purchase, setup
and management should all be trivial. Traditional software vendors
have driven costs down by mass-producing a single package and
pushing the expense of configuration and customization onto
customers. VA’s Build to Order Software System (BOSS) is a
primitive example of the vendor’s first steps to take these costs
back from the consumer. While appliance vendors like Cobalt (now
being acquired by Sun Microsystems) have gone much further down
this line, they’ve done so by removing customization and choice
almost completely from the equation.”