Re: Novell buys SUSE!!

From: Anthony Edwards (usenet_at_catfish.nildram.co.uk)
Date: 11/06/03 

Date: Thu, 06 Nov 2003 00:51:13 -0000

On Wed, 05 Nov 2003 10:54:58 -0800, Keith Clark
<clarkphotography@hotmail.com> wrote:

> Unfortunately that's not likely to happen. The Novell guys have said there's
> some "overlap" in the administrative areas which probably means headcount
> reductions in Marketing and Sales. Personally I think the headcount reductions
> would be better made at Novell, since they can't afford to get rid of the
> people who have made SuSE the successful product that it is.

Quite, not to mention the fact that, in my experience at least,
Novell's sales and marketing departments are completely and utterly
clueless. During the period from late 1998 until mid-2000 I worked
for a large UK software reseller, specialising in national and local
government and enterprise class accounts.

One of my roles was to write most of the software related content for
the bi-monthly company magazine, which went to every significant
contact at each customer site we had. This was an excellent
opportunity for each software vendor to get their products, and/or
new deals in front of prospective purchasers, and I used to contact
our software houses for copy a few weeks before each issue was due
to go to press.

I had a great deal of affection and respect for Novell technically,
and always attempted to give them the first crack of the whip, and
would contact their marketing folks on each occasion with a request
for information, news and interesting copy. I was never in all that
time successful in obtaining the information that I needed, so their
profile in our magazine was always a great deal lower than it could
or should have been (and our magazine was a significant generator of
incoming calls and sales leads).

In contrast, any time I asked Microsoft for assistance or copy, it
would appear on my desk within 24 hours, usually with some suggestions
or angles that could be used to enhance the article I intended
to write. Of course, the inevitable result was that Microsoft's
profile was a great deal higher than it would otherwise have been,
and they tended therefore to be one of the main beneficiaries of the
leads that the magazine's circulation generated.

If I were Novell, I would retain both SuSE's technical and sales and
marketing folks, and leverage the benefits of the excellent team of
people that they have just acquired. 

-- 
Anthony Edwards
anthony@catfish.nildram.co.uk

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