Today Novell Inc., (Nasdaq: NOVL) announced the addition of Bull to its PartnerNet® Technology Partner Programme.
This agreement is a significant milestone for Bull and Novell. It reinforces their position in the new market of high-end Linux based servers with scalable and reliable Linux based high-end solutions in commercial and scientific markets where Bull has gained a strong market recognition in Europe with its NovaScale server range.
Under this worldwide agreement, Bull will offer Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 on its whole range of open servers, notably EXPRESS5800 servers, Intel® Itanium® 2 based NovaScale servers and NovaScale Blade servers. This agreement also includes engineering cooperation and support services. Engineering cooperation between Novell and Bull labs will contribute to enhance mission-critical class features of Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. Bull will supply level-1 and level-2 customer support through its international support centres and its Linux competence centres. Bull will offer a complete range of services from audit and deployment to maintenance including 24h/24 support and high availability services
"This is a further step towards Novell extending its foothold and leadership position in the Linux operating environment," said Johan Rosius, Vice President, Alliances Novell EMEA. "Additionally, it marks a significant partnership between two companies committed to Open Source. The addition of Bull to the PartnerNet Programme is a critical move in Novell's strategy of partnering with the world's leading technology providers."
"Partnering with Novell in this agreement delivers significant enhancements to Bull's customers across the world," said Bruno Pinna, General Manager of the Intel Servers business unit at Bull. "Novell's vision and commitment to its customers is second to none, and the addition of its SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 to our server suite allows our customers to have their new applications and infrastructure rely on flexible and open servers
"Partners like Bull are critical to Novell's success in expanding into the Linux market," said Rosius. "Novell offers a multitude of advantages to partners as their customers are increasingly demanding competitive and reliable Open Source solutions."
Novell has more than 3,500 active channel partners worldwide in its PartnerNet program - with thousands more who sell Novell technologies - ensuring that customers can get qualified local sales and service support on Novell solutions.
About Bull
Bull designs and develops servers and software for an open environment, integrating the most advanced technologies. In this respect, Bull's range of NovaScale servers combines the openness of standards with the robustness of mainframes. It brings to its customers its expertise and know-how to help them in the transformation of their information systems and to optimize their IT infrastructure and their applications.
Bull is particularly present in the public sector, banking, finance, telecommunication, utilities and manufacturing sectors. Capitalizing on its wide experience, the Group has a thorough understanding of the business and specific processes of these sectors, thus enabling it to efficiently advise and to accompany its customers. Its distribution network spreads to over 100 countries worldwide.
About Novell
Novell, Inc. is a leading provider of information solutions that deliver secure identity management (Novell® Nsure™), Web application development (Novell exteNd™) and cross-platform networking services (Novell Nterprise™), all supported by strategic consulting and professional services (Novell NgageSM). Active in the open source community with its Ximian and SUSE Linux brands, Novell is firmly committed to open source and offers comprehensive Linux products and services for the enterprise, from the desktop to the server. Novell's vision of one Net - a world without information boundaries - helps customers realize the value of their information securely and economically. For more information, call Novell's Customer Response Center at (888) 321-4CRC (4272) or visit http://www.novell.com. Press should visit http://www.novell.com/pressroom.
Novell is a registered trademarks; Nsure, exteNd and Nteprise are trademarks; and Ngage is a service mark of Novell, Inc. in the United States and other countries. SUSE is a registered trademark of SUSE Linux AG. * All third-party trademarks are the property of their respective owners.