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Economic downturns have a tendency to accelerate emerging technologies, boost the adoption of effective solutions, and punish solutions that are not cost competitive or that are out of synch with industry trends.

So begins a new white paper from research analyst IDC. History supports the logic of the statement, but applying the same logic to predict the future is a dangerous game. Having good starting data can help considerably in that regard, though, and that’s what makes this report interesting. Its title is Linux Adoption in a Global Recession, and it marshalls some impressive data to predict that Linux will be a significant gainer, while others are punished by the current global meltdown.

The report bases its conclusion that Linux is well-positioned to be among the winners by observing that: “Linux users are clearly satisfied about their choice to deploy Linux, and during trying economic times, the potential for those same customers to ramp up their deployment of Linux isstrong. ” In other words, unlike the last recession, in which the free OS had to establish itself in environments where it had never been before (its market share increased dramatically), this time it need only increase its beachhead among existing users in order to post impressive gains. IDC predicts that it will quite well with new, missionary sales as well, however, promising that this time around, its competitive position should be greatly strengthened as well as broadened - including on the desktop.

The rest of the story is here

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Comments

• Andy Updegrove

  

  Andy Updegrove is a partner and founder of Gesmer Updegrove LLP, a Boston-based technology law firm, and has represented and helped structure more than 100 worldwide standard setting, open source, promotional and advocacy consortia over the past 22 years. He has also represented hundreds of both emerging as well as established technology companies, and is the founder and editor of both the popular website http://www.consortiuminfo.org and the widely-read Standards Blog

• Karen Copenhaver

  

  Karen Copenhaver is a partner in Choate, Hall & Stewart LLP ‘s Business & Technology practice focusing on technology transfer and licensing of intellectual property with a specific emphasis on open source business models. Most recently, Copenhaver was executive vice president and general counsel at Black Duck Software, Inc.