Microsoft Denies Sabotaging Mandriva Linux PC Deal

An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has denied sabotaging Mandriva's deal with the Nigerian government to supply Classmate PCs from Intel along with a customized Mandriva Linux operating system. 'From Microsoft's perspective it's a matter of choice. In the statement sent to InternetNews.com, Microsoft said it believes individuals, governments and other organizations should be free to choose the software and other technologies that best meet their needs. "We are seeing strong market demand for Windows on low-cost devices to help governments in the areas of education, local innovation, and jobs and opportunity," the Microsoft spokesperson said in the statement.' The company's denial is in response to Mandriva's CEO Francois Bancilhon expression of disappointment with Microsoft."

Title is Misleading

[kripkenstein]

The title is misleading. Microsoft did not say it didn't 'sabotage' the deal, it said

Microsoft operates its business in accordance [...] with the laws of the countries in which it operates

In other words, Microsoft considers itself to be acting within the law. Since this is Nigerian law, I am not sure this is saying much (although perhaps the laws are enlightened but never applied - same result). Furthermore, even in US or European law there are plenty of legal actions that most people would consider unethical, and perhaps that is what happened here.

Yes, business can be cutthroat at times, but when you get a tiny competitor's product to not be used even after being ordered by the customer and yours to replace it, things seem highly suspect. Since this is in Nigeria I presume no anti-trust actions will occur, but the relevant officials should take note.

Re:You can have any OS you like as long as it's ou

[arivanov]

12 or so years ago the days I sysadmined in an educational/research outfit in Eastern Europe. There was a 100% correlation between the so called local Microsoft rep for Education knowing about a shipment with Unix kit and the kit stolen at the cargo terminal. This was before the days of CCTV in the cargo areas at Sofia Airport so the interested parties had on the average between 2 and 12 hours to deal with all interesting containers and packages before they went through customs. In order to do that they needed one thing - to know which container is interesting.

Once we made sure that the aforementioned individual no longer had any information the shipments started arriving unmolested (not counting a dent or two in transit).

On top of that the aforementioned rep was handing out cracked copies of MSFT products the way drug dealers hand out cocaine laced candy to kids to anyone who wanted them.

This all continued until the country economy picked up enough. And then, you know the drill... Bill Gates having a meeting with the president on the subject of rampant software piracy and so on. The rep went to work elsewhere and claimed that he never ever had any relation with Microsoft. And so on...

Nuff said. No further comment necessary.

Re:I don't see the problem

[Anonymous Coward]

It's because they can smell a big huge stinky rat. There had been lengthy trials of both the OLPC and Classmate, and they chose a localised Mandriva PC over all comers from these lenthy trials, satisfied to the point of buying thousands. Then, once the deal is made, sealed and out the door, they decide the lengthy trials where MS competed and lost were wrong, and they needed an additional Microsoft software against their initial recommendations. It just stinks that they were offered the MS version, rejected it for an alternative, went through and purchased the alternative and then went back and changed their minds for additional cost to lock themselves into the MS monopoly.

Re:Oh really?

[erroneus]

I realize that my own local sampling isn't a large enough sample, but at my office, 4 people have purchased new computers with Vista on them. Of those, exactly 4 people wanted me to reload them with Windows XP. That's approximately 100% of my users disliking Vista and regretting their purchase decision when they expected to like Vista because it was newer and supposedly better.