OStatic

Sun Microsystems executives, speaking at last week's Sun Tech Days in Hyderabad, India, were quoted as saying that a widely expected recession in the United States would boost open source, instead of negatively impacting it. They also made the point that since Sun went predominantly open source, the company has fared much better financially than it did before. I don't doubt either of these points, but there's more to say.

Written by Allan Leinwand, a venture partner with Panorama Capital and founder of Vyatta. He was also the CTO of Digital Island.

The use of open-source software and commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware is making a profound impression on the telecom market -- one that seems destined to follow the path blazed by web economics. To date, the telecom industry has not yet fully embraced open-source and COTS hardware, something that I believe is a fait accompli -- regardless of any course of action taken by traditional vendors.