Sun Acquires Virtualbox Vendor Innotek
Sun Microsystems has been on another spending spree: Sun’s latest acquisition is said to be Innotek, the manufacturer of the Virtualbox Open Source virtualization solution.
According to a recent press announcement, Sun Microsystems has submitted a takeover bid to Innotek shareholders; the price was not disclosed. The young, German enterprise impressed its purchaser with figures of more than four million downloads since it released its code in January 2007. Virtualbox is to become part of Sun’s virtualization strategy, which the enterprise announced in November 2007 under the Sun xVM caption. "VirtualBox provides Sun with the perfect complement to our recently announced Sun xVM Server product" said Rich Green, Vice President Sun Software, and added: "and will align perfectly with Sun's other developer focused assets such as GlassFish, OpenSolaris, OpenJDK and soon MySQL." He sees Sun’s xVM server at the core of the data center and Virtualbox as the perfect match for any laptop or desktop. Sun xVM is based on the free Xen virtualization technology which Sun customizes and optimizes for its own applications.
Details of the acquisition and the price have not been disclosed, however, the press release does reveal that the transaction will not impact Sun’s profit per share. The deal is scheduled for completion in the third quarter of the 2008 fiscal year, which would be late March.
After MySQL, Innotek is the second Open Source company on Sun’s shopping list in recent weeks. January 16 Sun announced the acquisition of the company behind the MySQL Open Source database at a price of one billion dollars.
Virtualbox weighs in at less than 20MB and can be downloaded from the project website. The guest operating system supported by Virtualbox include Windows 3.1 through Vista, Linux Kernel 2.2, 2.4 and 2.6, Solaris x86, OS/2, Netware and DOS.
Issue 270/2023
Buy this issue as a PDF
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Find SysAdmin Jobs
News
-
OpenMandriva Lx 23.03 Rolling Release is Now Available
OpenMandriva "ROME" is the latest point update for the rolling release Linux distribution and offers the latest updates for a number of important applications and tools.
-
CarbonOS: A New Linux Distro with a Focus on User Experience
CarbonOS is a brand new, built-from-scratch Linux distribution that uses the Gnome desktop and has a special feature that makes it appealing to all types of users.
-
Kubuntu Focus Announces XE Gen 2 Linux Laptop
Another Kubuntu-based laptop has arrived to be your next ultra-portable powerhouse with a Linux heart.
-
MNT Seeks Financial Backing for New Seven-Inch Linux Laptop
MNT Pocket Reform is a tiny laptop that is modular, upgradable, recyclable, reusable, and ships with Debian Linux.
-
Ubuntu Flatpak Remix Adds Flatpak Support Preinstalled
If you're looking for a version of Ubuntu that includes Flatpak support out of the box, there's one clear option.
-
Gnome 44 Release Candidate Now Available
The Gnome 44 release candidate has officially arrived and adds a few changes into the mix.
-
Flathub Vying to Become the Standard Linux App Store
If the Flathub team has any say in the matter, their product will become the default tool for installing Linux apps in 2023.
-
Debian 12 to Ship with KDE Plasma 5.27
The Debian development team has shifted to the latest version of KDE for their testing branch.
-
Planet Computers Launches ARM-based Linux Desktop PCs
The firm that originally released a line of mobile keyboards has taken a different direction and has developed a new line of out-of-the-box mini Linux desktop computers.
-
Ubuntu No Longer Shipping with Flatpak
In a move that probably won’t come as a shock to many, Ubuntu and all of its official spins will no longer ship with Flatpak installed.