[Info-vax] VSI strategy for OpenVMS

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 9/14/2021 10:55 PM, David Goodwin wrote:
> On Wednesday, September 15, 2021 at 2:24:06 PM UTC+12, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> On 9/14/2021 10:08 PM, David Goodwin wrote:
>>> On Wednesday, September 15, 2021 at 12:24:18 PM UTC+12, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>>> On 9/14/2021 7:52 PM, David Goodwin wrote:
>>>>> Because realistically what can VMS do that isn't cheaper and easier
>>>>> on Linux besides "run existing VMS applications"? Why pay for VMS to
>>>>> run ports of Linux software when you could just run Linux software on
>>>>> its native platform for free?
>>>> There is no license cost for Linux, but companies
>>>> pay for support. Using RHEL is not free.
>>>>
>>>> So there is be room for charging.
>>>>
>>>> But long term RHEL can probably be seen as a cap for what
>>>> can be charged.
>>>
>>> Any idea what RHEL actually costs compared to OpenVMS? I've really
>>> got no idea. RedHat must make a fair bit of money though given what IBM
>>> spent buying them in 2019 ($34bn). Thats more than twice what Compaq
>>> spent buying all of DEC ($15bn in 2019 money).
>> Not that much per system.
>>
>> https://www.redhat.com/en/store/linux-platforms
>>
>> But some customers got a lot of systems.
> 
> I suppose an interesting point is that companies _choose_ to pay RedHat,
> Canonical, SuSE, etc. There is no threat of having their servers turned off
> if they decide to stop paying a subscription fee or RedHat goes out of
> business. There is always the option of paying nothing and running a Linux
> distribution with no commercial support.

Yes.

They can run the exact same code base by running RockyLinux.

But some companies want support.

Especially when it is not prohibitive priced.

> If there were a fully functional version of OpenVMS that was free for
> commercial use would enough companies continue to pay VSI for support
> to keep the whole thing viable?

VMS systems are usually business critical and not in massive scale - I
suspect that a pretty big share of VMS customer want support.

I do not expect VSI to make VMS available for free for general usage.

VSI already have good programs for ISV's and hobbyists.

>                                  Or is RedHats business model only viable
> due to the sheer size of the Linux market?

The Linux model is a bit unique.

Arne