| Novell appoints overseer of Microsoft pact |
Nov. 30, 2006
Novell Inc. announced Nov. 30 that it has appointed Susan Heystee, the company's recently named vice president and general manager for Global Strategic Partners, to manage the relationship with Microsoft under the recently announced Novell-Microsoft agreement.
Heystee will oversee both the business and technical cooperation components of the agreement, in an effort to ensure that Novell customers gain the maximum benefit from interoperability work around Linux. The appointment of a senior business leader to this position reflects the significance Novell places on promoting the adoption and ease of integration of Linux into customers' mixed environments, according to the company.
This senior-level appointment may also be in response to both the criticism the partnership has engendered from other open-source companies and organizations, and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's recent insinuations regarding Linux and patents.
In the announcement of Heystee's new role, Tom Francese, Novell's executive VP for worldwide sales, stated, "We needed someone with a strong business background and deep customer knowledge to manage this relationship for us. Having run Novell Americas until her recent move into the partnering role, Susan was the perfect choice. She'll ensure that the benefits of this agreement on paper get translated into reality for customers."
As vice president and general manager for Global Strategic Partners, in addition to keeping an eye on Novell's relationships with IBM, HP, Dell, Heystee will now keep a close eye on the Linux company's relationship with Microsoft.
Heystee will oversee the multiple facets of the Microsoft agreement, including technical cooperation efforts on virtualization, web services management and document compatibility, the business relationship around Microsoft distribution of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server subscriptions, and joint marketing and sales cooperation. Heystee joined Novell in March of 2004 as vice president and area general manager for the Midwest, and was promoted in August of 2005 to president, Novell Americas, overseeing sales, consulting, and customer support for Novell in the region. Heystee assumed her new position on Nov. 1.
Commenting on her new role, Heystee said that Novell "[sees] this agreement with Microsoft as a fundamental step forward for Linux, and we're strongly committed to driving Linux more firmly into enterprise environments, from the desktop to the data center."
"For customers who want to use both Linux and Windows, we're going to make life significantly easier. We know customers, partners and the community are looking for concrete results from this agreement, and I'm excited to help deliver those results," she added.
-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
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