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FY 09 was a big year for the penguinopen source was embraced with even higher intensity as proprietary software providers wholeheartedly supported the model. After the controversial Novell-Microsoft deal in 2006, Red Hat too signed a major interoperability deal with Microsoft, launching an integrated product offering in the virtualization space.

Whats more, in a move that surprised the entire open source community, Microsoft contributed 20,000 lines of source code to the Linux Kernel. In addition, government and education sectors have gradually evolved into open source loyalists and are banking on open source as the best way to promote IT penetration. IDC predicts that worldwide revenue for open source software will balloon to $5.8 bn in 2011.

Low total cost of ownership (TCO), high levels of security that meet even mission critical needs, reduction in development of cost-prohibitive factors, easy migration to new IT projects or software initiatives are some of the key factors that have led to higher adoption of OSS within the government and other large mission critical programs.

The National Resource Center for Free/Open Source Software (NRCFOSS) is in the process of introducing FOSS in the curricula of engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Gujarat, and Rajasthan. FOSS is also playing an increasingly important role in Indian e-governance. NRCFOSS and CDAC have launched Debian based BOSS Linux distribution, tailored for government departments in many languages. NIC has built several portals and applications using Plone, a FOSS-based content management system.

Government Loyal to OSS
Kerala took the lead in open source by becoming the first state in the country to completely banish proprietary software in the IT test administered to half a million students every year. In addition, government officials of Kerala announced to use only free software running on the Linux platform for computer education, starting with the 2,650 government and government-aided high schools. Following this example, Tamil Nadu plans to distribute 1,00,000 Linux laptops to its students.

CyberMedia Research                                                                                              DQ Estimates

A number of state and central governments actively embraced Linux; however, with Red Hat too signing an interoperability deal with Microsoft, there seems to be temporary truce between Linux and Windows

One of the major open source deployments has been carried out by the Government of Maharashtra (GoM). Open source solutions have been implemented for various e-governance projects including Land Records Management System, Treasury Management System (Kosh Vahini), Document Journey Management System, and Computerization of Citizen Facility Center. Other government departments like Andhra Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation, Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation, and several other government bodies and projects have embraced Linux and open source in a big way.

While state governments have taken the lead in deploying open source for some of their mission critical projects, the Center is also not far behind. Projects like e-courts promoted by the Supreme Court, Sarva Shiksha Abhyaan promoted by the Ministry of HRD, and the e-Posts project by the Department of Posts, are all examples of large nationwide projects that have taken to open source as a platform of choice.

The e-Post application, by NIC, is developed on RHEL & JBoss and provides transparency in transactions, expenditures, financial statements, and better budget monitoring. The Supreme Courts e-courts project is a major effort towards computerizing all districts and session courts by providing over 12,000 laptops that run on Red Hat Linux to judges across the country.

Even the armed forces are seeing the value proposition in open source software and are using it as they become net-centric. The Indian Government is likely to adopt Sun Microsystems OpenSparc processor design technology, along with the Linux OS and MySQL open source database software, for what is being tentatively called the India microprocessor.

Enterprise Uptake
The primary reason for this significant shift towards FOSS is that Linux operating systems and open source based software in general have reached critical marketplace mass. The increasing interests of industry heavyweights such as Microsoft and Oracle and others have given Linux a kind of validity that was missing in the earlier years. This in turn is encouraging user organizations to look at Linux more seriously and deploy it in crucial enterprise environments. After BFSI, telecom, and media are the verticals that are increasingly opting for Linux to run their enterprise applications. One of the latest entrants in the Indian telecom space, Virgin Mobile, is using Linux for its VAS applications.

Reliance ADA has adopted Linux for its data center, entertainment, and capital business. VSNL has adopted Linux for managed services whereas Airtel has adopted open source for its internal consumption as well as a part of its service offerings. Other Indian companies, such as Life Insurance Corporation of India, Canara Bank, and Tata Communications also use open source technologies as a core part of their business. Amongst corporates, some leading adopters are Axis Bank, Cleartrip.com, HDFC Bank, The Indian Express, HT Media Group, and Naukri.com. According to IMS Research, handset OEMs and network operators are also increasingly turning to Linux based operating systems to lower costs and diversify their product portfolios.

Vendor Moves
While the highest growth came from the government, education and telecom verticals, Red Hat also began to focus on transport as an emerging vertical after the success of the online reservation project last year. Red Hats subscription based transaction model helped it gain further market share in the enterprise segment. The Microsoft interoperability tie-up helped Red Hat to extend services to heterogeneous environments. The acquisition of KVM and the desktop virtualization capability (VDI) from Qumranet propelled its capabilities in the end-to-end virtualization space.

Novell too achieved major inroads into the government vertical and saw increasing demand from PSU and banking sector. While its overall Linux business grew by almost 57%, its desktop, server, and data center virtualization businesses were the key growth drivers. Four key acquisitionsSiteScape, Platespin, Managed Objects, and Fortifyall helped to enhance its OSS and delivery stack.

Ubuntu, who initially seemed like the only possible competitor to the two main players, continues to only focus on desktop users. After Dell, Ubuntu has gone ahead and partnered with other leading PC manufacturers for pre-installed Linux desktops.

With Indian enterprises, government and even PSUs having adopted Linux and OSS in a big way, the next wave of growth is slated to come from the SOHO and desktop users. OSS vendors are already partnering with OEMs on pre-installed Linux OS to tap this segment. Also localization efforts by the Linux community and increased efforts to offer open source products in multiple languages (similar to efforts by Red Hat India) will further drive the uptake of OSS in the country.

Priya Kekre
priyak@cybermedia.co.in

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