Novell

History

2014: The company becomes a part of Micro Focus

In 2014 Novell passed under control of Micro Focus International.

2011: Apple, EMC, Microsoft and Oracle buy up patents of Novell

In April, 2011 it became known that prolonged approval of the transaction about Novell sale to the new owner, it seems, comes to an end: the U.S. Department of Justice announced on what conditions consortium CPTN Holdings where Apple, EMC, Microsoft and Oracle enter, patents of Novell or the license for these patents will be able to purchase. Agreed terms of the transaction strongly differ from initial, and now CPTN Holdings does not pose a significant threat for development of the Open source software any more^[1].

The U.S. Department of Justice announced introduction of amendments to the agreement between Novell and consortium CPTN Holdings about acquisition about 882 patents of Novell within the multi-stage transaction on sale of Novell of rather little-known company Attachmate. Let's remind that CPTN Holdings includes a number of the leading IT companies, including, Apple, EMC, Microsoft and Oracle, and acquisition of patents of Novell by them caused essential concern in community of the Open source software, as formed the basis for a little prolonged consideration of terms of transaction from the U.S. Department of Justice and antimonopoly department of Germany.

'The ministry stated that as it and affirmed initially, the transaction will threaten the innovation and competitive possibilities of the Open source software, such as Linux, said in the official press release of the U.S. Department of Justice. – Though the ministry will also give the consent to the conclusion of the transaction, it will continue to monitor how patents of Novell will be distributed among owners of CPTN'.

It was initially planned that the transaction will pass in two stages: on the first patents of Novell will pass into the order of CPTN Holdings, and at the second stage they will be distributed among participants of CPTN. However now, according to the results of consideration of the agreement in the Ministry of Justice, terms of transaction were changed thus, 'to protect the competition and the innovation activity in community Open Source'.

In particular, the made changes provide that Microsoft will sell back Attachmate that share of patents which had to pass with it according to the results of the transaction, but at the same time will obtain licenses to use of these patents and also the patents purchased by three other participants of consortium. EMC will not begin to purchase 33 Novell patents concerning software for virtualization. Acquisition of patents at Novell will be performed with observance of GNU General Public License 2.0 and the license of patent community Open Invention Network. CPTN will not have the right to limit a circle of the patents available under the license OIN. Neither CPTN, nor owners of consortium will make statements or to undertake the actions aiming to have an impact on Novell or Attachmate or to push them to change of a circle of patents which will be available on the terms of the license OIN.

By consideration of terms of transaction the American Ministry of Justice worked in close cooperation with the German colleagues: 'The Ministry of Justice and federal antimonopoly agency of Germany very densely interacted at implementation of this investigation, – the deputy assistant to the chief prosecutor Sheris Pozen reported (Sharis A. Pozen). – It is an excellent example of the international cooperation between two departments'.

The famous analyst specializing in the questions connected with legal aspects of use of information technologies of Andrew Updegrove, welcoming the made changes, said: 'It in many respects the tremendous statement along with several points of view. First, the detail level of the imposed restrictions testifies to such level of understanding of the Open source software in general and Linux in particular which in the past was never shown from regulators. If to compare with meanwhile when activity of Microsoft last time was exposed to similar consideration, then the present agreement also confirms essentially new relation to case both from the American and German instances, and from Microsoft. In last Microsoft was more located to fight, than to agree, and positions of the USA and the European Commission strongly dispersed. The reached agreement unambiguously does the Open source software by one of key objects on the card of the American regulation'.

Let's remind that in the notification of Novell published earlier it is told that the granted patents and patent requests which CPTN is going to sell, first of all, are connected with software for management of corporate computer systems, software for file management and collective work of the corporate level – in addition to the patents business-related on management of identity (identity management) and security though there is some probability that a part of the granted patents and patent requests can belong to several categories of software products.

2010: Attachmate Corporation purchases Novell for $2.2 billion

On September 15, 2010 short article with reference to insider sources according to which in the next weeks the company will be separated into two parts was published in the New York Post newspaper, and the business connected with SUSE of Linux will depart to one buyer, and remained – to the private investor. Any of expected buyers is not called.

According to a source, the amount of the expected transaction will exceed the offer of Elliott Associates rejected by Novell in March, 2010. Then Elliott Associates suggested to purchase Novell at the price of $5.75 for an action (total amount of the transaction – about $2 billion).

At this time not really safe financial performance of Novell gave abundant food for rumors about a possible company takeover, and, the business connected with SUSE of Linux was most of all discussed. Among possible applicants for Novell purchase analysts call SAP, IBM, VMware, Oracle and even Microsoft.

The former employee of Novell Joe Brockmeier read out the most probable option from VMware. Recently the relations between two companies go uphill, and the agreement on inclusion of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server in structure of solutions on virtualization of vSphere of VMware was signed. Besides, the SUSE Studio application allowing 'in two clicks' to create the ready images of operating systems suitable for start in virtual machines, can be of the most direct interest to VMware: at competitors of SUSE similar offers are absent now.

In November, 2010 it became known that the Novell company announced the conclusion of the final agreement about merge according to which the Attachmate Corporation company will purchase Novell at the price of $6.10 for one action; total amount of the transaction will be about $2.2 billion.

The Novell company also announced the conclusion of the final agreement on simultaneous sale of some assets of intellectual property of CPTN Holdings LLC, the consortium of the hi-tech companies organized by Microsoft corporation for $450 million, and this amount will be considered in the expected purchase price which Attachmate Corporation should pay. The expected price is $6.10 for an action for 28% of high price of stocks of Novell at the time of closing of biddings on March 2, 2010, in the last day of biddings to the declaration by Elliott Associates company about the offer of the redemption of all outstanding shares of Novell on the price of $5.75 for an action, and 9% above than the share value of Novell at the time of closing of biddings on November 19, 2010.

Attachmate Corporation is going to manage Novell as two business divisions: Novell and SUSE and to attach them to other holdings, Attachmate and NetIQ. As the financial advisor of Novell JP Morgan, and acts as the legal advisor — Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher &Flom LLP. As financial advisors of Attachmate Corporation Credit Suisse and RBC Capital Markets, and act as the legal advisor of Jones Day. Copyright of the Unix operating system belonging to Novell company after sale to the company will remain under control of the new owner – Attachmate companies, but as a part of other intellectual property will not be sold to Microsoft.

At this time Novell specializes in the field of technology intellectual management of workloads (Intelligent Workload Management), helps the organizations to provide and administer safely IT services based on physical, virtual or cloud computing environment.

Business in the CIS

Main article: Novell of the CIS

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