Stories about: Siebel Systems

The U.S. patent and legal system has turned into a battlefield where companies and technology developers can be attacked. Open-source and free software developers have historically ignored this secondary battlefield, focusing instead on the primary battlefield of development and proliferation of their project. This omission leaves open-source projects and individual developers vulnerable to patent infringement lawsuits. By creating its own defensive patent portfolio as commercial companies do, the open-source community can arm itself for this battle.

Oracle CEO, Larry Ellison, is considering the release of its own version of Linux after realising the purchase of one of the two major Linux vendors was not cost-effective, according to a story in the Financial Times.

Open-source customer relationship management startup SugarCRM is planning to open an office in Shanghai later this year initially to house 15 to 20 engineering and quality assurance staff, according to the company's chief executive officer (CEO).

Oracle scooped up another small technology maker on Friday, announcing its acquisition of Finnish open-source database technology developer Innobase OY. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Bowing to market realities, Microsoft said it will begin working with an ideological foe, open-source development and services company JBoss, on optimizing interoperability between JBoss' middleware and Microsoft's Windows Server software.

Among the ways Ameritrade Holding is looking to reduce IT complexity and costs is a decision to move Unix platforms to Linux operating systems running on Intel-based hardware -- a process the company began a year ago and hopes to complete in 18 months.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is protesting a proposal by the US Copyright Office that may temporarily require online forms to be submitted using only Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browser or Netscape browsers.

SugarCRM is hedging its bets that corporations are sick of paying high licensing fees for CRM software. The 5-month-old company last week announced a new version of its freely available salesforce automation software, plus the addition of subscription-based technical support and training services.

Six top software vendors warned this week that they will report lower-than-projected revenues for the second quarter, blaming a slowdown in spending by U.S. customers last month.

IBM has announced a new software strategy, with accompanying products, designed to circumvent Microsoft's lock on operating systems and productivity applications.

Microsoft, IBM and BEA Systems plan to submit their Web services choreography and business process specification, initially proposed in August 2002, to a standards body later this week.