AlexGr writes "Jeff Gould presents an interesting analysis in Interop News:
How can an open source software company with $70 million or so in revenue and no profits to speak of be worth $1 billion? That's the question Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz has been trying to answer since he bought MySQL last week.
Like most commercial open source companies, MySQL makes money by enticing well-heeled customers to pay for an enterprise version of its product that comes with more bells and whistles than the community version it gives away for free.
It appears though that the additional features of the Enterprise version are not enough to compensate for the revenue-destroying effects of the free Community alternative. What else could explain the surprising fact that MySQL has quietly filled out its open source portfolio with a closed source proprietary management software tool known as Enterprise Software Monitor?
http://www.interopnews.com/news/can-sun-make-mysql-pay.html" Link to Original Source
This discussion was created for logged-in users only, but now has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
Can Sun make MySQL pay? 0 Comments More Login /
Get More Comments