Red Hat’s share price has slumped by almost a quarter
after Oracle announced it is going after Red Hat’s Linux support
revenues with its own service targeted at Red Hat
customers.
Red Hat has in turn criticised Oracle’s Unbreakable Linux
programme, announced by Oracle chief executive officer Larry
Ellison at the company’s annual Oracle Openworld user conference
this week.
Oracle has pledged that it will offer enterprise Linux support
equivalent to that which Oracle offers for its own database and
applications, while at the same time offering a Linux support
package to Red Hat customers which it says is much cheaper.
But Red Hat has now responded to Oracle’s announcement on its
website, under the ‘Unfakeable Linux’ heading, saying, “Oracle's
support for Linux reaffirms Red Hat's technical industry leadership
and the end of proprietary Unix.”
Replying to speculation that Oracle’s move could be the end of
the two companies’ existing market partnership, Red Hat said, “Red
Hat has had a productive seven-year relationship with Oracle.
“Red Hat will continue to work closely with Oracle to optimise
Red Hat Enterprise Linux and JBoss middleware subscriptions for
Oracle products, and to support joint customers.”
Red Hat then went on to trash Oracle's full support promises for
Red Hat Linux.