SCO Preps Appeals Against Novell and IBM 163
An anonymous reader writes "It looks like SCO will be emerging from the almost dead soon, with new owners and $100 million on board. SNCP is adjusting the business strategy, according to this report on TG Daily, SCO is saying goodbye to CEO Darl McBride and is also preparing to appeal the summary judgments in the cases against Novell and IBM. If you have thought the chapter was closed, think again. Those $100 million can go a long way (even if SCO has to pay 17% interest on it)."
What the hell? (Score:2, Interesting)
money doesn't cure everything (Score:3, Interesting)
Even a large infusion of cash is unlikely to do SCO any good. They have no income to speak of and no product likely to generate any. Their lawsuits have no chance of succeeding given the ruling that they never acquired the Unix copyrights from Novell. Even in the extremely unlikely event that this is overturned on appeal, they still have to prove infringement of their copyrights, which, with discovery complete, they have still been unable to do, and they have to overcome the problem that they themselves distributed Linux under the GPL, which is a huge problem for them. Finally, no matter what happens, they are going to have to pay millions to Novell since they failed to pass on to Novell the income from their franchise to sell Novell's Unix property, for which they (SCO) were merely to receive a 5% fee. Money will pay the lawyers a little bit longer, but it isn't likely the lawyers can postpone the end very much.
Put SCO down (Score:5, Interesting)
How many of you would contribute $50 to take a controlling interest in this festering pimple of an "IP" company? If the next ~80,000
Create a non-profit (name it SLASHX, perhaps) or some other legal entity, raise funds and buy shares. The percent of ownership remaining appears on a sidebar with a link to some collection agency. Make Stallman or some other credible figure chairman and just keep buying shares till "we" hold 51%.
I'm no financial guru. Perhaps the idea is naive. However, you can damn well bet I'd contribute.
Re:poetic justice (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't forget that the loan shark gets a controlling interest in the company. What are the chances the shark (acting as SCO) is going to ask itself (SNCP) for millions of dollars to pay a judgment to Novell? If/when that happens, the shark needs to ask itself whether its worth the risk, even at 21%. It only makes sense if SNCP really believes that SCO can get the Novell judgment reversed on appeal and win some money from IBM. That could be a big, risky bet.
The deal appears to be that SNCP is committed to loaning SCO $95 million, but only once. If the SNCP loans SCO $95 million on Monday and SCO repays the loan on Tuesday, it appears that the commitment has been fulfilled.
Re:Inaccurate subject (Score:2, Interesting)
1. Take control of a second-rate UNIX distributor 2. Squander all the products that were being made to the point there is no actual product development taking place. 3. Hire your lawyer brother and go after giant technology companies *and* customer companies simultaneously for copyrights you *know* you don't have. 4. Tie up the court system for more than five years. 5. Go bankrupt. 6. Get bought out. 7. ??? 8. Profit!!!
Step seven might multiply into numerous more steps for Darl. Only an idiot would stick around after nearly killing a company and letting it get bailed out of a shithole he dug it into. Joking aside, for me, I only see up as a direction for SCO with a moron like Darl out of the picture. With the UNIX copyright clearly not in their hands, I don't see any way they can make much more out of the FUD they've been doing. So yeah, Darl has made an ass of himself in the industry, but I doubt he's anywhere near penniless because of it.
Re:poetic justice (Score:5, Interesting)
Won't stick (Score:5, Interesting)
Stephen Norris Capital Partners (SNCP) (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Put SCO down (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, it's quite possible Novell will own them anyway before this has finished playing out, because of the $37M SCO owes them. This shell game with loans won't necessarily change that. While they're posturing hard now, I have my doubts as to whether these "angels" will really cough up all that money when the courts force the company to do that.
Re:Darl could learn from the Monkey Dancer (Score:3, Interesting)
They have been for years. Did you just now notice this? Or are you stating this for the benefit of the few people who don't know? (Obviously, that would include some fairly wealthy people... or people with ulterior motives.)
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:PJ must be relieved... (Score:5, Interesting)
The current top article, for example, is about the ISO BRM on OOXML.
I am really amazed that Slashdot hasn't picked up this story yet. I mean, I just can't believe it! This is the story of the week. This is a huge thing, as those who have been following it are well aware. The process at the BRM was so flawed as to bring into serious question the integrity of the ISO/IEC JTC-1. I won't add to the tens of thousands of lines of text that have been written about it here, in fear of being ruled off-topic. I only want to question why this hasn't been aired on Slashdot.
Beginning on Friday, I was scanning the news anxiously to see how the BRM went, and shortly the first reports began to emerge. By Monday, the first report from an actual BRM participant [robweir.com] came out. By Tuesday, the available information was growing exponentially. I was following all this on Groklaw, and kept flipping back and forth from Groklaw to Slashdot to see if they had picked it up yet. When a second blog by Andy Updegrove [consortiuminfo.org] became a resource of links to every report by BRM participants, I could wait no longer. I wanted to see how this story was viewed by my fellow Slashdotters, naturally. I was so concerned that this still hadn't reached Slashdot that I reluctantly submitted the story myself. Then I started backtracking on the Firehose and discovered that there had already been 6 submissions at that point, and that was on Monday. I'll bet there have been dozens by now, besides thousands of people people clicking on those "Submit to Slashdot buttons all over the place". I just can't imagine why the editors haven't put this important story in front of Slashdot readers yet.
Please forgive me for interrupting the current story. I just had to get this off my chest.
Re:Put SCO down (Score:4, Interesting)
So as soon as anyone acquires anywhere close to enough stock to make a voting difference the board of directors will just issue more voting stock which they will control. Source:http://yahoo.brand.edgar-online.com/fetchFilingFrameset.aspx?dcn=0000891020-07-000020&Type=HTML [edgar-online.com]
Re:Put SCO down (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The Wizard of Oz (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Inaccurate subject (Score:3, Interesting)
They're still trading in the pink slips. Tht's why they issued some shares with a strike price of 8 cents when they were around a nickel, then went on this latest crusade to pump the price back up. Nice way to double your money without spending a penny.
Re:Doesn't the sale have to be approved first? (Score:-1, Interesting)
Re:money doesn't cure everything (Score:3, Interesting)
BTW, is there anybody here who believes that crap about SCO and mobile markets? They have about the same ability to compete in the global mobile marketplace as I do.
You guys completely miss the point (Score:4, Interesting)
If they've got their mitts on some more money then more legal work is a good way to pump some of that cash into a safe place. No point in them leaving cash in a sinking ship.