He can't say he wasn't warned. In June, 2002, when Darl McBride was getting ready to take over as chief executive at struggling Caldera International Inc. in Lindon, Utah -- later renamed SCO Group Inc. -- he mused that claiming ownership of some of the underlying code in the popular Linux computer operating system could keep the company afloat. Even though Caldera's revenues were declining, it was losing $5 million per quarter, and its stock had slid below the $1 NASDAQ delisting price, the reaction of outgoing CEO Ransom Love was instantaneous. "Don't do it," Love says he told McBride. "You don't want to take on the entire Linux community."
McBride did it anyway. Last March, he shook up the computer world by filing a $3 billion suit against tech giant IBM (IBM), claiming Big Blue had illegally inserted more than 800,000 lines of SCO-owned software code into Linux. Since then, McBride has turned up the heat. In December, SCO sent letters to more than 1,000 Linux customers accusing them of illegally using SCO's property. Now, the company warns that it will sue a Linux user within days. One potential target, SCO says, is Internet search phenom Google Inc. The company, which says it has not talked to SCO about its claims, uses Linux computers and is on the verge of its initial public offering.
You can read the complete article at
Business Week Online, a good read if you want to catch up on those SCO suits, etc.
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