Linux Goes Mainstream

He'll be the first to admit it: Troy Webb has struggled trying to do business with channel newbie and Linux stalwart Red Hat.

Despite being one of the open-source company's top-tier partners and having an office right up the street in Morrisville, N.C., Webb says he perseveres in the relationship mainly because he's grown convinced that the Linux platform is moving up the stack and opening doors for a variety of technology solutions.

The reason is simple: The groundwork being laid by ISVs, solution providers, distributors, vendors and others in and around the open-source market is paving the way for a better future, one without the security woes of Microsoft's Windows-based solutions and the inflexibility of proprietary systems. Profits are on the rise and the chance to move up the software stack to deploy more sophisticated mission-critical applications has also become more of a reality with Linux.

For example, Webb's 5-year-old company, InCentric Solutions, has grown to 30 people and emerged as one of the strong IBM partners in the Carolinas. It's pursuing opportunities in life sciences and other fields, helping to displace Windows installations in some settings while complementing them in others.

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His company created five Linux bundles around IBM products that IBM didn't have bandwidth for. Although he's losing money on some, the loss leaders open up doors for other open-source opportunities.

"We're busily putting IBM's product line together with Red Hat's operating system for cross-collaborative solutions like WebSphere Portal on Linux or Lotus Domino on Linux," Webb says. "It's by far the majority of our business."

New Horizons

While Linux for years has held strong as an infrastructure platform--namely, on the strength of the Apache Web server--the platform is moving closer to the center of the IT stack. This is due in part to the likes of Red Hat and Novell and their subscription-based support for the software. As a result, recent momentum finds Linux becoming both a replacement and a complement to existing Windows installations (as opposed to just a Unix-migration strategy), and a platform for delivering VoIP and other communications technologies.

Experts are finding that VARs and other solution providers are indeed developing promising business models around open-source technologies.

Rick Vieth, senior practice manager at CMP Technology's Institute for Partner Education and Development (IPED), found as much in a new study of 400-plus solution providers pursuing opportunities using Linux software. One of the findings his study uncovered was the bifurcation of the Linux market when it comes to solution providers. On one hand, there are a group of integrators that can be best described as Linux dabblers. They have in-house expertise and capabilities but have not made Linux their specialty. Then there are the hard-core Linux enthusiasts that generate as much as 20 percent or more of their revenue from working in and around Linux and open-source software. They have, on the average, twice the number of on-staff Linux experts as Linux dabblers.

Vieth says the more money channel companies put into Linux, the more profits they extract from their Linux practices. Like many, he believes the opportunities are endless for those who commit themselves to the open market. And a great place to start, he agrees, is by building atop the LAMP stack of products in use today.

NEXT: What many channel players haven't realized about open source.

What many in the channel may not realize is how far open-source technology has come in just the past two years. While more remains to be done--there's only one commercial-grade collaboration package available for Linux today, IBM Lotus Notes--there are several developments that companies can leverage to further penetrate existing accounts and attract new ones.

IBM, working in tandem with Novell, for example, has produced solutions that aim to exploit the basic LAMP stack, which is increasingly ubiquitous on non-Windows servers. Recently, Big Blue and Novell helped create the so-called Integrated Stack for Linux, aimed at partners serving the SMB market.

One of the growing areas for VARs is in Windows replacement with Linux, which heretofore hasn't been the primary use-case for the open-source OS. That's changing now as some customers decide not to wait for Microsoft's Longhorn server OS late next year, or to look for a way to cut down on licensing costs. According to the IPED study, Windows accounts for half of operating systems replaced by Linux for solution providers surveyed.

But more practical than out-and-out replacement is the co-existence of both Windows and Linux in a single environment, made simpler by a number of technologies, from virtualization to centralized management tools and consoles such as that from Centeris.

Vista Killer?

Then there's Linux on the desktop. Much has been made lately of Novell's newly released SuSE Enterprise 10 Desktop as a possible contender against Microsoft's late-to-the-dance Vista. Solution providers have given the product high marks thus far, and Novell is pushing it hard, arguing that desktop Linux is finally ready to evolve from an OS for fixed-function thin clients or technical workstations to one for everyday office computers.

"We see SuSE Enterprise 10 Desktop as a basic knowledge-worker desktop," says Ladd Timpson, worldwide channel marketing director at Novell. "A $50 desktop provides for all the apps and the environment that you're used to using."

Speaking of applications, that's what will drive the success of desktop Linux--and Linux in general. The more ISVs write to the platform, the more choices customers have and the better positioned VARs will be to sell the stack convincingly.

InCentric's Webb cautions that interoperability among open-source applications and existing environments remains a major challenge for those solution providers pushing Linux systems. Ironically, though, it's also a boon for savvy solution providers that sell technical- and business-consulting assessments of customers' IT environments in advance of deployment.

All in all, the momentum for Linux and its open-source brethren continues to gather steam, Webb says. "We're really inundated by this."