Sun Micro Gambles On Free Operating System
Sun Micro Gambles On Free Operating System
Greg Levine, 11.15.04, 12:32 PM ET
NEW YORK - Doers and doings in business, entertainment and technology:
More than one way to skin a market. Sun Microsystems (nasdaq: SUNW - news - people ) believes the pricing on Solaris 10 will be irresistible: nada. The tech giant invested some $500 million on Solaris, its next-generation operating system, and spent years in research and development. But Chief Executive Scott McNealy avers that even if Sun charges nothing directly for the OS, the R&D time and treasure invested will reap rich tangential rewards. "Hewlett Packard sells a printer at a low price and makes a lot of money on printer cartridges. Gillette gives you the razor and makes a lot of money on the blades," said McNealy. "There are different ways to drive market penetration." Besides boosting demand for its servers, Sun is betting the zero price tag will also lure developers to write programs for computers running the OS. And last but not least, the firm will charge subscription fees for Solaris support and service. Solaris 10 is being unveiled Monday at an event in San Jose, Calif., and will be officially launched at January's end. The OS will work on more than 270 computer platforms running on chips from Sun, Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people ) or Advanced Micro Devices (nyse: AMD - news - people ).
Greg Levine, 11.15.04, 12:32 PM ET
NEW YORK - Doers and doings in business, entertainment and technology:
More than one way to skin a market. Sun Microsystems (nasdaq: SUNW - news - people ) believes the pricing on Solaris 10 will be irresistible: nada. The tech giant invested some $500 million on Solaris, its next-generation operating system, and spent years in research and development. But Chief Executive Scott McNealy avers that even if Sun charges nothing directly for the OS, the R&D time and treasure invested will reap rich tangential rewards. "Hewlett Packard sells a printer at a low price and makes a lot of money on printer cartridges. Gillette gives you the razor and makes a lot of money on the blades," said McNealy. "There are different ways to drive market penetration." Besides boosting demand for its servers, Sun is betting the zero price tag will also lure developers to write programs for computers running the OS. And last but not least, the firm will charge subscription fees for Solaris support and service. Solaris 10 is being unveiled Monday at an event in San Jose, Calif., and will be officially launched at January's end. The OS will work on more than 270 computer platforms running on chips from Sun, Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people ) or Advanced Micro Devices (nyse: AMD - news - people ).
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- Sun Micro Gambles On Free Operating System
- 纸马
- 2004-11-16 12:20
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原来好像也不要钱吧
- mahakala
- 2004-11-16 12:41
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