OStatic

Oracle's lingering takeover of Sun Microsystems stands to do a lot for Sun, but at the moment, the lifeboat is just out of reach. As a result of its continuing losses, Sun is dramatically slimming down ? several thousand of the company's employees won't be returning after the New Year's break.

Cutting employees, of course, means cutting the things they work on, and that could spell trouble for some of Sun's less profitable ventures.

According to the New York Times and Bloomberg, IBM's purchase of Sun Microsystems is imminent. The official announcement and terms of the acquisition will most likely be made public on Monday, but a late in the day announcement hasn't been ruled out. It's estimated that the purchase will cost IBM nearly $7 billion.

There's been much speculation and discussion both here at OStatic and elsewhere about what this means for Sun and its open source projects.