With a partner like Sun, who needs competitors?
- Shankland covered the tech industry for more than 25 years and was a science writer for five years before that. He has deep expertise in microprocessors, digital photography, computer hardware and software, internet standards, web technology, and more.
"We are the most partnered company on the planet," boasted Sun Chief Executive Scott McNealy at a quarterly product launch Tuesday. But just because a company is a Sun partner doesn't mean it's protected from McNealy's competitive barbs.
Microsoft, once a bitter enemy, has become something of a Sun ally as a result of a partnership signed a year ago. But not too much of an ally. McNealy said Tuesday that Sun's Java technology is ahead of Microsoft's .Net competing programming environment: "It is really mankind versus .Net, and we're winning. When it's mankind vs. anybody, mankind eventually wins."
Rivalry aside, Sun and Microsoft will present fruits of their alliance in a May 13 event, McNealy said.
And Red Hat, whose version of Linux Sun resells, should be worried by the 1.3 million downloads of Solaris 10, he said. "I would not want to be Red Hat right now," McNealy said.
Even Oracle, whose database software is widely used on Sun hardware, got a ribbing. Showing a slide of himself in his typical casual jeans and Oracle CEO Larry Ellison in a typically snappy suit, McNealy quipped, "I could buy a house with the cost of his outfit."