McNealy: Sun’s Not Going Anywhere
Source: CMPnet
Sun Microsystems will start shipping hardware and software products on a quarterly release schedule of “network computer” products to help customers better integrate its computers, storage equipment, and middleware. At an event in San Francisco on Monday to unveil this quarter’s new products (see Sun Shines A Light On Lower Prices), InformationWeek senior writer Aaron Ricadela spoke with Sun CEO Scott McNealy.
InformationWeek: How does Sun plan to stay relevant to its business customers–through its ability to design better hardware and software, to integrate complex technology for customers, or something else?
McNealy: Anybody with cash is going to remain relevant; people with an installed base, with a developer community, with a great brand. When’s the last time you saw a new computer company? We’re not going anywhere.
Sun has always had a little different strategy, always a little ahead, through our use of open interfaces and Unix. Now, we have a new initiative. We spent half a billion dollars on research and development to build server-room platforms, and we’ll spend another half-billion in the next 90 days. We’re calling it the “NC 03 Q1.” If you go into any switch room–at Pac Bell, AOL, General Motors, or eBay–each one has a different setup; they’re like fingerprints. What we’re announcing is a whole new set of Lego blocks. We’ll build, test, and certify them. Our announcement is not a set of products, but a set of components that are all integrated, all tested, all backward compatible. It’s a different model than IBM. Complexity is their friend. We say, “Let’s solve it with R&D.”
InformationWeek: What are Sun’s R&D priorities?
McNealy: We’re spending about 15 percent of revenue on R&D, compared with about 5 percent historically. Blade servers, for instance, allow you to mix and match AMD, Intel, and Sparc chips, 32-bit and 64-bit, and network, storage, and server elements. We have a new Sparc blade, and in the second quarter you’ll see an x86 blade.
InformationWeek: As Sun continues to deliver new products using x86 chips, for what jobs do you see Sparc remaining customers’ top choice in the future?
McNealy: People want Sparc for its large [memory] address space, for SMP, for our absolute scalability, from one way to 100 way. Edge serving, tier one, and tier zero has said, “32-bit is just fine.” We think people will say it’s way easier to go from Solaris on Sparc to Solaris on x86. We think Solaris on x86 is going to be a big winner this time around. We’ve been doing Solaris x86 for years, and most of the downloads have been on the server side. With the rise of the Java Virtual Machine and Sun One stack on Solaris, [developing software on the x86 platform] doesn’t force you to go to Linux. Now, all these apps you have will be bit-for-bit and bug-for-bug compatible.
InformationWeek: This week, Sun is introducing price cuts of as much as 21 percent on some midrange and high-end servers. Are there areas where you’ll need to enact further price cuts to stay competitive?
McNealy: It’s an opportunity. Our gross margins grew 6.1 percent last quarter–people always want to ascribe a reason. I can’t say what will happen this quarter, but if there are more cuts, you’ll be the first to know. I can’t tell you, but it’s worth asking.
More space, science, and technology from RedNova