Sun offers govt $1 software

By Candice Jones for Sun Microsystems
Johannesburg, 17 Oct 2008

Sun Microsystems is bidding to overhaul government's office software with its proprietary version of Open Office.

According to Sun's head of global system engineers, Tisch Tischendorf, the company has offered to provide government with StarOffice at a licence agreement of $1 per instance.

“They are basically looking at two alternatives: our StarOffice offer, or complete open source software that can be downloaded from the Internet.”

The company is also working on a more conducive service, training and maintenance agreement that will suit government budgets. “Our policy right now is to ensure government will pay no more than they are already for those services. We are hoping to come in lower though.”

He says the final offer will be consolidated by next week, and actual figures will be available. The offer is also built on open principles, meaning government will not have an all or nothing choice, but rather can mix and match the software it chooses for its employees.

Tischendorf explains the deal has been offered for all government levels and departments.

Sun has been closely aligned with the open source community for some time, and has pushed the arena as its business strategy. While the StarOffice solution is being offered on a proprietary model, Tischendorf says the value comes with OEM backing.

In an earlier interview with Sun this year, the company explained that with multiple developers from all over the world contributing to Sun's version of Open Office, the company has to vet all the code that is included. This means companies that buy a licence from Sun know they will be protected from legal action if stolen code is implemented in the office package.

Sun says this is particularly important for small businesses and government organisations, since legal suits could destroy them.

It adds that it will also build a dedicated team that will only service government, should the offer be accepted. “We will bring on partners and work together with government's Foss [free and open source software] team to implement and maintain the systems. It is far too big a project to handle on our own.”

Openly Foss

Near the end of last year, government announced its Foss policy, which has created a high level of credibility for the local use of open source software.

Frost & Sullivan's analysis, “South African Open Source Software Market”, shows that both the public and private sectors will benefit from the expansion of open source. “OSS provides SA with an alternative to the costly applications of proprietary software vendors,” said the company's industry analyst, Lindsey Mc Donald.

The report adds that government's adoption of the Foss policy is a major driver for the market, as OSS will be used at all levels of the government where it is comparable to, or more suitable than proprietary software.

In June, the State IT Agency (SITA) also declared it would pioneer the overhaul of government software to open standards by implementing those standards within the agency.

SITA had chosen Ubuntu for its desktop operating environment, with Open Office, as well as several other Foss applications. The agency alone has around 2 300 permanent employees and 1 300 contractors.

Support issues

As to Sun's StarOffice offer, Anthea Summers, acting GM of corporate communications at SITA, says: “From a SITA perspective, an offer has been made, but no offer has been accepted and the discussions on the matter are ongoing.

“SITA's future model with regards to open source is to enter into agreements with vendors to provide support,” she explains.

“However, these agreements would be flexible, based on agreed time frames, which gives SITA the ability to assess the quality of the support and either continue with the service or consider alternatives.

“SITA is at the moment, through its FOSS Programme Office, doing an analysis and investigation into how much is being spent on support of the current office software, but at this point in time the numbers have not been finalised,” Summers adds.