[ale] How the Borg Looks at Us

[Charles Shapiro]

This fell into my hands through a colleague. I thought it interesting.
Please note that I do not necessarily endorse the opinions or
conclusions offered in this missive. 

See y'all Saturday I hopez!

-- CHS

-----Forwarded Message-----

> From: Steve Ballmer [mailto:steveballmer at ceo.microsoft.com] 
> Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 4:04 PM
> Subject: Customer Focus: Comparing Windows with Linux and UNIX
> 
> In the thousands of meetings that Microsoft employees have with
> customers around the world every day, many of the same questions
> consistently surface: Does an open source platform really provide a
> long-term cost advantage compared with Windows? Which platform offers
> the most secure computing environment? Given the growing concern among
> customers about intellectual property indemnification, what's the best
> way to minimize risk? In moving from an expensive UNIX platform, what's
> the best alternative in terms of migration?
> 
> Customers want factual information to help them make the best decisions
> about these issues. About a year ago, a senior Microsoft team led by
> General Manager Martin Taylor was created to figure out how we could do
> a better job helping customers evaluate our products against
> alternatives such as Linux/open source and proprietary UNIX. This team
> has worked with a number of top analyst firms that have generated
> independent, third-party reports on cost of acquisition, total cost of
> ownership, security and indemnification. Some of the studies were
> commissioned by Microsoft, while others were initiated and funded by the
> analysts. In each case, the research methodology, findings and
> conclusions were the sole domain of the analyst firms. This was
> essential: we wanted truly independent, factual information.
> 
> At the same time, our worldwide sales organization is going even deeper
> with customers to understand their needs and create a feedback loop with
> our product development teams that enables us to deliver integrated
> solutions that support real-world customer scenarios, and
> comprehensively address issues such as manageability, ease of use and
> reliability.
> 
> I'm writing to you as a subscriber to executive emails from Microsoft,
> and to other business decision makers and IT professionals, to share
> some of the data around these key issues - and to provide examples of
> customers who opted to go with the Windows platform rather than Linux or
> UNIX, and how that's playing out for them in the real world. Much more
> information on this is at www.microsoft.com/getthefacts.
> 
> TOTAL COST OF OWNERSHIP AND ACQUISITION COSTS
> 
> In the past few years, you haven't been able to open a computing
> magazine or visit a technology Web site without running into an article
> about Linux and open source. Not surprising: who doesn't like the idea
> of a "free" operating system that just about anyone can tinker with?
> 
> But as the Yankee Group commented in an independent, non-sponsored
> global study of 1,000 IT administrators and executives, Linux, UNIX and
> Windows TCO Comparison, things aren't always as they seem: "All of the
> major Linux vendors and distributors (including Hewlett-Packard, IBM,
> Novell [SUSE and Ximian] and Red Hat) have begun charging hefty premiums
> for must-have items such as technical service and support, product
> warranties and licensing indemnification."
> 
> Yankee's study concluded that, in large enterprises, a significant Linux
> deployment or total switch from Windows to Linux would be three to four
> times more expensive - and take three times as long to deploy - as an
> upgrade from one version of Windows to a newer release. And nine out of
> 10 enterprise customers said that such a change wouldn't provide any
> tangible business gains.
> 
> Yankee also noted that, for larger organizations with complex computer
> networks, it's important to look beyond Linux's initial low investment
> cost and consider all of the TCO and ROI factors. 
> 
> This is exactly what one of our large enterprise customers, Equifax, did
> recently. Equifax, a $1.2 billion U.S.-based enterprise with 4,600
> employees in 13 countries, needed more computing power than its
> mainframe systems could deliver for rapidly searching the company's vast
> marketing database. They spent several months conducting an internal
> analysis, which proved that, compared with Linux, Windows would realize
> a 14% cost savings and shorten their time to market by six months.
> (Equifax Case Study -
> http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/casestudies/CaseStudy
> .aspx?CaseStudyID=15528)
> 
> Another comprehensive, non-sponsored study by Forrester, entitled The
> Costs and Risks of Open Source, drew a similar conclusion: "The allure
> of free software is accelerating the deployment of open source
> platforms, but open source is not free and may actually increase
> financial and business risks."
> 
> In early 2004, Forrester conducted in-depth discussions with 14
> companies that had been running Linux platforms for longer than one year
> to see what the costs really were. Several key themes emerged:
> 
> - Few companies know what they're really spending. Only five of the 14
> kept detailed metrics - and each of those five found Linux more
> expensive (5% to 20%) than their current Microsoft environments.
> 
> - Preparation and planning activities took 5% to 25% longer for Linux
> than Windows. 
> 
> - Training for IT employees was significantly higher for Linux than for
> Windows - on average, 15% more expensive. The reasons: training
> materials were less readily available, and customers spent more on
> training to compensate for the lack of internal knowledge about Linux.
> 
> - All 14 companies said it was difficult finding qualified Linux
> personnel in the marketplace to support their Linux projects. When they
> did find third-party help, they had less leverage negotiating hourly
> rates than with Windows consulting resources.
> 
> One of our mid-market customers, Computer Builders Warehouse (CBW), came
> to a similar conclusion. CBW builds computers to order for education,
> government, and corporate customers. Several years ago, it deployed Red
> Hat and Mandrake versions of Linux to support its corporate, retail and
> e-commerce applications. Challenged with high costs, CBW subsequently
> migrated to Microsoft Windows Server System, and reduced its total cost
> of ownership by 25 percent. It also consolidated its server population
> by 50 percent, reduced maintenance time by 50 percent, and boosted
> developer productivity by 200 percent. These benefits - totaling
> $650,000 in savings - are dwarfed by the millions of dollars in new
> revenue that CBW expects as a result of bringing a key security and
> monitoring product to market more than two years faster than it could
> have done using Linux. (CBW Case Study -
> http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/casestudies/CaseStudy
> .aspx?CaseStudyID=15131)
> 
> SECURITY
> 
> About three years ago, we made software security a top priority, and
> since then we've invested heavily in a multi-pronged effort to improve
> software quality and development processes, and to reduce risks for
> customers through education and guidance, industry collaboration and
> enforcement. I think it's fair to say that no other software platform
> has invested as much in security R&D, process improvements and customer
> education as we have at Microsoft.
> 
> Still, Linux has often been touted as a more secure platform. In part,
> this is because of the "many eyeballs" maxim of open source software
> that claims a correlation between the number of developers looking at
> code and the number of bugs found and resolved. While this has some
> validity, it is not necessarily the best way to develop secure software.
> We believe in the effectiveness of a structured software engineering
> process that includes a deep focus on quality, technology advances, and
> vigorous testing to make software more secure.
> 
> A number of third-party reports have questioned how safe the Linux
> platform really is. For example, a recent independent study by
> Forrester, Is Linux More Secure than Windows?, highlighted that the four
> major Linux distributions have a higher incidence and severity of
> vulnerabilities, and are slower than Microsoft to provide security
> updates.
> 
> According to Forrester, Microsoft had the lowest elapsed time between
> disclosure of a vulnerability and the release of a fix. They found that
> Microsoft addressed all of the 128 publicly disclosed security flaws in
> Windows over the 12-month period studied, and that its security updates
> predated major outbreaks by an average of 305 days. 
> 
> Other independent sources of data show similar conclusions. According to
> statistics posted on the security Web site Secunia
> (http://secunia.com/product/2535#statistics_month), Red Hat Enterprise
> Linux 3 has averaged 7.4 security advisories per month, compared with
> 1.7 advisories for Windows Server 2003.
> 
> And as Yankee Group noted in its Linux, UNIX and Windows TCO Comparison
> study, "Linux-specific worms and viruses are every bit as pernicious as
> their UNIX and Windows counterparts - and in many cases they are much
> more stealthy."
> 
> This was a deciding factor in farmaCity's selection of Windows over
> Linux. Headquartered in Buenos Aires, farmaCity is a rapidly growing
> Argentinian drugstore chain with 50 outlets and 1,200 employees.
> Although farmaCity's growth in recent years was a testament to its
> success, the company's aging technology infrastructure had become a
> hindrance to further expansion. After careful analysis, farmaCity
> concluded that Windows would reduce network administration by 30 percent
> compared with Linux, and would also simplify identity and desktop
> management. But the core reason for selecting Microsoft was the increase
> in network security, complemented by the ability to reduce
> patch-deployment time by 50 percent while cutting unsolicited e-mail by
> half. (farmaCity Case Study -
> http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/casestudies/CaseStudy
> .aspx?CaseStudyID=15269)
> 
> INDEMNIFICATION
> 
> Increasingly, we're hearing from customers that another factor in their
> consideration of computing platforms is indemnification. In 2003, we
> looked at our volume licensing contracts to see what we could do to
> increase customer satisfaction, and a top issue we heard about was
> patent indemnification, which then was capped at the amount the customer
> had paid for the software. So later that year, we lifted that cap for
> our volume licensing customers, who are most likely to be the target of
> an intellectual property lawsuit.
> 
> Today, when a volume licensing customer - a business or organization
> ranging from as few as five computers to many thousands - licenses a
> Microsoft product, we provide uncapped protection for legal costs
> associated with a patent, copyright, trademark or trade secret claim
> alleging infringement by a Microsoft product. We do this because we are
> proud to stand behind our products, and because we understand that being
> on the wrong end of a software patent lawsuit could cost a customer
> millions of dollars, and massively disrupt their business.
> 
> No vendor today stands behind Linux with full IP indemnification. In
> fact, it is rare for open source software to provide customers with any
> indemnification at all. We think Microsoft's indemnification already is
> one of the best offered by the leading players in the industry for
> volume licensing customers, and we're looking at ways to expand it to an
> even broader set of our customers. It's definitely something businesses
> want to think about as they're building or expanding their IT
> infrastructure.
> 
> It was certainly a factor for Regal Entertainment Group, the largest
> movie theatre chain in the world. In 2001, they moved to Red Hat Linux.
> After evaluating Linux in their business for several months, however,
> they migrated to the Microsoft platform - not only because of lower TCO,
> stronger support and services, and greater reliability and
> manageability, but because they were more fully indemnified on IP. J.E.
> Henry, CIO of Regal Entertainment, told me that "reduced risk was a
> decision factor in selecting Windows over Linux. We needed to minimize
> our exposure to the distraction of potential IP infringement claims, and
> we had a big enough open source presence to be concerned. With the way
> that Microsoft stands behind its products, it's one less thing that I
> have to worry about."
> 
> UNIX MIGRATION
> 
> One of the hot topics among enterprise IT and business decision makers
> today is the costs and benefits of migrating enterprise resource
> planning systems (ERP) from costly, proprietary UNIX environments to
> Windows or other platforms. ERP integrates various company functions
> such as human resources, inventories and financials, and links a company
> to its vendors and customers.
> 
> An independent, qualitative survey of organizations that recently
> completed a migration of their SAP or PeopleSoft ERP system from a UNIX
> environment to the Microsoft Windows Server platform found a more than
> 20% reduction in the number of servers required compared with UNIX. The
> survey, by META Group, found that in one large telecommunications
> company, consolidation on Windows allowed a greater than 50 percent
> reduction in the number of required servers.
> 
> The survey also found a more than 50 percent improvement in areas such
> as reliability, accessibility and scalability; significant savings in
> cost management, IT staffing, performance monitoring and vendor
> management; and measurable savings in technical support and training.
> More than half of business function decision makers also saw significant
> improvements in areas such as consistency, accuracy, reporting
> enhancement and performance.
> 
> "Windows is now a mainstream option for the vast majority of ERP
> projects," META Group concluded.
> 
> A great case study is the Raiffeisen Bank Group, the largest private
> bank group in Austria with about 2,600 branches. It wanted to reduce
> costs and provide better customer service by consolidating the number of
> servers in its branches by 50 percent. Raiffeisen investigated migrating
> from UNIX to either Linux or Windows. After evaluating the possible
> solutions, the company found that Windows Server 2003 would provide the
> most economical solution along with better performance, while giving
> bank employees an integrated view of customer information that they
> needed to improve customer service. (Raiffeisen Bank Group Case Study -
> http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/casestudies/CaseStudy
> .aspx?CaseStudyID=15519)
> 
> One of our mid-market customers had a similar experience. Grand
> Expeditions is a consortium of luxury travel companies that
> significantly reduced its Web development and hosting costs, and
> improved site reliability and performance, by moving from a combination
> of Linux- and UNIX-based servers to Windows Server 2003 and the Windows
> Server System. The new system was up and running in just 60 days, and is
> saving Grand Expeditions $200,000 a year. (Grand Expeditions Case Study
> -
> http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/casestudies/CaseStudy
> .aspx?CaseStudyID=15397)
> 
> IN CLOSING...
> 
> There is no question that customers are benefiting today from a healthy,
> competitive IT industry. Competition requires companies to really focus
> in on what customers want and need. At the same time, customers have a
> clearer opportunity than ever before to evaluate choices.
> 
> For example, BET.com, the Internet portal created by Viacom subsidiary
> BET Networks, did an in-depth comparison of Red Hat Linux and Windows
> Server System. They found that Windows offered 30% lower TCO, was more
> secure and reliable, and enabled quicker time to market. As BET.com's
> CTO, Navarrow Wright, said: "When I looked at all the costs - not just
> the straight price of software - a Windows Server System-based solution
> made better financial sense than sticking with our Sun and Oracle
> environment or switching to Linux. We decided to migrate the whole
> enterprise from various software vendors to standardize all of our
> software on Microsoft."
> 
> By implementing Windows Server 2003, Windows XP Professional, Office
> Professional Edition 2003, Exchange Server 2003, Content Management
> Server 2003 and Visual Studio .NET 2003, BET.com conservatively
> estimated that its workforce will increase productivity by 25-30%, while
> saving significantly in licensing and redevelopment costs.
> 
> As organizations increasingly rely on IT to perform mission-critical
> functions, and with complexity a growing challenge, choosing the right
> computing platform for the long term can make the difference between
> profit and loss, and between future success and failure. And it's pretty
> clear that the facts show that Windows provides a lower total cost of
> ownership than Linux; the number of security vulnerabilities is lower on
> Windows, and Windows responsiveness on security is better than Linux;
> and Microsoft provides uncapped IP indemnification of their products,
> while no such comprehensive offering is available for Linux or open
> source.
> 
> The vision and benefits of an integrated platform are what distinguish
> Microsoft's approach to software. The Windows platform today offers an
> unmatched level of value, applications availability, simplicity,
> security and productivity. For Microsoft, this is truly a cross-company
> effort that requires the server and client operating systems to
> seamlessly deliver great usability and manageability features,
> applications that deliver compelling scenarios, and tools that enable
> developers and ISVs to easily and quickly build new applications on the
> platform.
> 
> It's important that customers have all the information they need when
> making critical and expensive IT decisions. If the evidence at our
> www.microsoft.com/getthefacts Web site doesn't sufficiently convey the
> benefits and value of the Microsoft platform, we want to hear from you
> so we can work even harder to get that information to you. If you would
> like to have a more detailed discussion about your company's IT needs,
> email Martin Taylor at martinta at microsoft.com.
> 
> Steve Ballmer
> 
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