Montavista argues that delaying computer and software upgrades is a bigger risk for companies than a potential court action from SCO, adding new bitterness to the battle between SCO and the open source software community which began in March.
In that month, SCO filed a $1 billion court action against IBM – later upping its claim to $3 billion – alleging that IBM gave UNIX rights away to Linux in breach of a contract between SCO and IBM.
In May, SCO went further, claiming that Linux is an unauthorised derivative of UNIX and that legal liability for the use of Linux may extend to commercial users. SCO suspended all of its future sales of the Linux operating system until further notice – and terminated IBM's license to sell AIX, IBM's version of UNIX.
Early this month, Linux distributor Red Hat joined the fray, lodging a pre-emptive court action against SCO. The claim argued that Red Hat's technologies do not infringe any intellectual property of SCO and seeks to hold SCO accountable for "unfair and deceptive" actions.
SCO made light of the allegations and announced a licensing package for all Linux users – and fixed its prices.
The dispute intensified as IBM lodged a counterclaim against SCO, arguing that SCO cannot sue over patents that may have been used in Linux, because it was distributing Linux products itself under the GPL (General Public License - an open source license set up in the 1980s).
SCO has since responded by saying that the GPL is invalid, with the result that what started out as a breach of contract case has snowballed into an action that threatens the open source movement.
Whatever the ultimate outcome of the court actions, the uncertainty is having an effect on the Linux market. Last week, open source software company Montavista issued its statement to reassure its customers, confirming that it does not believe that there is any merit in the SCO lawsuit.
Nor does it believe that SCO has any rights to challenge the GPL, saying that the "claims by SCO's lawyers are both a misreading of the GPL and a misstatement of federal law." Montavista adds, "Basically, SCO's Linux past assures the safety of your royalty-free Linux future."
The company warns:
"Delaying a commitment to Linux will only delay your company's move to the leading next-generation embedded platform. Delay will slow your access to key technology and business innovation. While SCO's actions may present a visible, short-term annoyance, we believe the risk of any outcome adverse to Linux is very low, and is nothing compared to the risk you face by staying with outmoded and proprietary embedded platform software."
The statement came at the same time as an SCO customer forum was taking place at which, according to Computer Business Review Online, the SCO Chief Executive, Darl McBride confirmed, "We are prepared to have this heard on a quicker basis in a customer environment if that's what it takes to quicken it up".
According to the report, SCO is in the process of identifying suitable users for court action.
"Instead of doing mass-mailings we're now taking a very targeted approach," McBride told ComputerWire. He confirmed that the likely target would be a company using both Linux and IBM's AIX and Dynix operating systems – an attempt to kill three birds with one stone. Chris Sontag, senior vice president of the company told ComputerWire, "There is no warranty for infringement of intellectual property [in the GPL], so all of the liability ends up with end users."
Montavista disputes this, saying, "Anyone familiar with the GPL, and certainly anyone with a legal background, understands that not only can suppliers offer indemnities (and warranties, support, etc.) on GPL-licensed code, but that the Free Software Foundation (the authors of the GPL) encourages suppliers to do so!"
Montavista is only one of a host of open source companies, groups and advocates that have spoken out against SCO's actions. The response has been so overwhelming that last week Darl McBride accused IBM of orchestrating the attacks. According to a report on ComputerWeekly.com, he said:
"We have absolute direct knowledge of this. If you go behind the scenes, the attacks that we get that don't have IBM's name on them, underneath the covers, are sponsored by IBM."
IBM's spokeswoman Trink Guarino told ComputerWeekly.com that, "the open community is completely capable of reacting on its own to SCO's allegations."