I think they are being desperate here. The company has not been making a lot of money. On top of it, they really have not brought out any actual innovation to open source, either to the developer and enthusiast, or to the corporate or ISV who wants to use open source.
They are hoping to exploit a virtually untapped SME market out in the U.S there which wants to use low-cost open source software but do not have the skills in Linux or other open source OSes.
However it remains to be seen how much actual demand is there for some of these solutions. The start itself is quite bizarre since most of the Drupal installations are on Linux boxes, not Windows. Who runs Drupal on windows btw ? Are existing users of Drupal running them on Linux boxes going to migrate to Windows because SpikeSource is supporting Drupal on Windows ? Of course not. They would not even need the SpikeSource customized solution on Linux, since they will have much more expertise in Drupal and the underlying LAMP stack than SpikeSource.
It is one thing to innovate and create a market need and then go in and capture that market, it is quite something else to chase dollars in markets that do not exist. That is stupidity.
Anand, Thanks for the response. That helps me eliminate spike from the list of my potential employers(I quit my job); as it is I had a pretty bad experience working for a startup that was heavily involved with open source. Not sure what it's about companies claiming to be doing open source and lacking in business sense completely ? Maybe there's just too much VC funding out there for people who have the right connections and make the right kind of noises.This just doesn't apply to open source, even if the pitch is in an area considered hot currently, then the purse strings seem to loosen considerably.Example s - Web 2.0 startups, virtualization etc. I was wondering why consulting gets such a bad rap today - they do what people want and are not chasing mirages. Maybe the mercenary attitude of most consulting comapnies is responsible.
Good luck. I think we have met a couple of times @ Bangpyper meetings.
Yes, I think you would do well to avoid them. As you might know, I happen to be an ex-employee, though I have removed all references to them from my website, except those in the comments for this post.
4 comments:
Anand,
What are your thoughts - good or bad ?
I think they are being desperate here. The company has not been making a lot of money. On top of it, they really have not brought out any actual innovation to open source, either to the developer and enthusiast, or to the corporate or ISV who wants to use open source.
They are hoping to exploit a virtually untapped SME market out in the U.S there which wants to use low-cost open source software but do not have the skills in Linux or other open source OSes.
However it remains to be seen how much actual demand is there for some of these solutions. The start itself is quite bizarre since most of the Drupal installations are on Linux boxes, not Windows. Who runs Drupal on windows btw ? Are existing users of Drupal running them on Linux boxes going to migrate to Windows because SpikeSource is supporting Drupal on Windows ? Of course not. They would not even need the SpikeSource customized solution on Linux, since they will have much more expertise in Drupal and the underlying LAMP stack than SpikeSource.
It is one thing to innovate and create a market need and then go in and capture that market, it is quite something else to chase dollars in markets that do not exist. That is stupidity.
Anand,
Thanks for the response. That helps me eliminate spike from the list of my potential employers(I quit my job); as it is I had a pretty bad experience working for a startup that was heavily involved with open source. Not sure what it's about companies claiming to be doing open source and lacking in business sense completely ? Maybe there's just too much VC funding out there for people who have the right connections and make the right kind of noises.This just doesn't apply to open source, even if the pitch is in an area considered hot currently, then the purse strings seem to loosen considerably.Example s - Web 2.0 startups, virtualization etc. I was wondering why consulting gets such a bad rap today - they do what people want and are not chasing mirages. Maybe the mercenary attitude of most consulting comapnies is responsible.
Good luck. I think we have met a couple of times @ Bangpyper meetings.
Yes, I think you would do well to avoid them. As you might know, I happen to be an ex-employee, though I have removed all references to them from my website, except those in the comments for this post.
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