Sun Acquires Virtualbox Vendor Innotek
Sun Microsystems has been on another spending spree: Sun’s latest acquisition is said to be Innotek, the manufacturer of the Virtualbox Open Source virtualization solution.
According to a recent press announcement, Sun Microsystems has submitted a takeover bid to Innotek shareholders; the price was not disclosed. The young, German enterprise impressed its purchaser with figures of more than four million downloads since it released its code in January 2007. Virtualbox is to become part of Sun’s virtualization strategy, which the enterprise announced in November 2007 under the Sun xVM caption. "VirtualBox provides Sun with the perfect complement to our recently announced Sun xVM Server product" said Rich Green, Vice President Sun Software, and added: "and will align perfectly with Sun's other developer focused assets such as GlassFish, OpenSolaris, OpenJDK and soon MySQL." He sees Sun’s xVM server at the core of the data center and Virtualbox as the perfect match for any laptop or desktop. Sun xVM is based on the free Xen virtualization technology which Sun customizes and optimizes for its own applications.
Details of the acquisition and the price have not been disclosed, however, the press release does reveal that the transaction will not impact Sun’s profit per share. The deal is scheduled for completion in the third quarter of the 2008 fiscal year, which would be late March.
After MySQL, Innotek is the second Open Source company on Sun’s shopping list in recent weeks. January 16 Sun announced the acquisition of the company behind the MySQL Open Source database at a price of one billion dollars.
Virtualbox weighs in at less than 20MB and can be downloaded from the project website. The guest operating system supported by Virtualbox include Windows 3.1 through Vista, Linux Kernel 2.2, 2.4 and 2.6, Solaris x86, OS/2, Netware and DOS.
Issue 255/2022
Buy this issue as a PDF
News
-
Linux Mint Edge Is Ready for the Newest Hardware
With the release of Linux Mint 20.03 comes a new version geared for newer hardware.
-
Linux Mint 20.3 Now Available
That latest release of Linux Mint is now available for general use and offers a polished, but less Mint-y theme.
-
Linux is Getting an Exciting New Firmware Feature
Intel is bringing a new driver to the 5.17 kernel that will make it possible to update firmware without a reboot.
-
Elementary OS 6.1 Has Been Released
The .1 version of the sixth iteration of elementary OS (named Odin) is now available for download and takes the distribution to new heights of refinement.
-
Linux Mint 20.3 Beta is Now Available
The developers of Linux Mint have made the beta of their latest release available for download and installation.
-
EndeavorOS 21.4 Has Arrived
Arch-based EndeavorOS 21.4 is finally available for download with plenty of new features and improvements.
-
NixOS 21.11 Now Available for Download
NixOS “Porcupine” has been made available for installation and includes numerous improvements.
-
KDE Plasma Developers Introduce a GNOME-Like Overview
A new overview effect makes it easier for users to interact with both Plasma Activities and Virtual Desktops.
-
Rocky Linux 8.5 Now Available with Secure Boot Support
The latest iteration of CentOS alternative, Rocky Linux has arrived and includes numerous updates as well as support for Secure Boot.
-
System76 Developing a New Desktop Environment
The makers of Pop!_OS are currently in the early stages of creating a brand new, non-GNOME, desktop environment.