A theme of mine for a few years has been that the last bulwark protecting the Wintel monopoly from GNU/Linux was lack of retail shelf-space. That bulwark has crumbled in China and several other Asian nations. This week, retail shelves will be liberated in India, thanks to Dell and Canonical getting together to produce a bunch of notebooks preloaded with Ubuntu GNU/Linux.
“Dell laptops pre-loaded with Ubuntu will be sold in 850 retail outlets in India”.
“The choice of form factor reflects the demand for mobile computing in India, where Dell, already the number one manufacturer, is growing fast. Ubuntu provides a legal, full-featured and flexible alternative to proprietary software, with a range of popular applications included by default. And thanks to the Ubuntu Software Centre, it offers easy access to hundreds more, from business productivity and scientific research to games and social media.”
It’s hard to estimate the numbers of new GNU/Linux PCs coming to market as a result of this move but even a few per day at 850 stores is pushing one million. Assuming the price is much lower than Wintel and price matters, there could be many more. This single move could multiply the units shipped with GNU/Linux globally as Mark Shuttleworth predicted. I assume that Dell did this as a result of experience with stores shipping GNU/Linux in China last year. That must have affected the bottom line enough to make it feasible in India. The world has entered the “end days” of monopoly. If competitors of Dell copy this move we could eventually see the day when that other OS has only a fraction of retail shelf-space. If results from China and India are good, that will happen sooner rather than later.
Since GNU/Linux sells itself, there will be a multiplier from the efforts of Dell and Canonical. The more units in the hands of consumers the greater the demand for GNU/Linux to all retailers and OEMs. If “8″ is pushed on OEMs and retailers, expect that leverage to bear heavily in 2012/2013. The world of IT could be quite different by Q4. In its last quarterly report to the SEC, Dell reported 52% of revenue comes from outside USA, the home of Wintel. Growth in China was 9%. How much of that was from selling GNU/Linux?
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Well, you can always install a pirated Windows on those cheap computers. A win-win situation. And one is in dire need, as Ubuntu is a certified piece of crap.
Viktor wrote, “you can always install a pirated Windows on those cheap computers.”
No, you cannot. Often M$ has no driver and M$ intends not to boot on most hardware soon. I suppose someone could hack around that but it’s less work just to use */Linux.
Often M$ has no driver
Of course these are Dell machines and Dell has drivers galore for Windows OS versions.
But, ignoring that, how long do you think it will take before some effect of this is seen in the fortunes of MSFT or DELL? All we have here is a sunshine piece from Canonical and it is unwise to trust such a one-sided press release.
Viktor
Your comment refers “….. Ubuntu is a certified piece of crap.”
Certified by who ? you ?
Clarence Moon wrote, “how long do you think it will take before some effect of this is seen in the fortunes of MSFT or DELL? All we have here is a sunshine piece from Canonical and it is unwise to trust such a one-sided press release.”
We have seen a kink in M$’s growth for a couple of years now. If they had an OS that could have run properly on the smart thingies, they might have had explosive growth. Instead OEMs who are not M$’s biggest partners got that growth selling Android/Linux. It’s just a matter of time before all of the OEMs are hedging by shipping GNU/Linux in huge quantities. In 2011, more smart thingies shipped with Android/Linux than that other OS. That’s a lost opportunity if not a sharp drop in revenue. It’s only a matter of time before there is a drop in revenue. They are at a point of little or no growth in revenue for the desktop/notebook OS. Between the growth of ARM, the economy and inroads of GNU/Linux doors and windows are closing for M$.
$58.4B in 2009, $62.4B in 2010, $70.0B in 2011, and an expected $74B in 2012 is “a kink in MS growth”? You are straining to make a case that no one is likely to believe, Mr. Pogson.
I believe the question was “How long?” and your answer seems noncommittal when you say “only a matter of time”. One thing that I see is that the money in the phone/tablet product market that is attributable to OS software is minuscule at best.
That may change as Microsoft gets into the business with the Nokia phones and now their own Surface products. Only time will tell.
@John Roberts:
Uh, let me think, by disgruntled Ubuntu users!? By a disgruntled FLOSS community who despise Canonicals bragging and the damage they do?
Clarence Moon wrote, of M$’s growth, You are straining to make a case that no one is likely to believe, Mr. Pogson.”"
Count the desktop OS growth, not the diversified corporation. I care nothing about Xboxes and their other revenue. People foolish enough to play with M$ deserve what they get. I do care about killing off the monopoly on the desktop OS. That is happening. M$ has had ~0 growth while the world moves on. Then there’s mobile with ~100% per annum growth and M$ is a no-show.
Count the desktop OS growth, not the diversified corporation.
It is an ecology sort of thing, Mr. Pogson. One hand washes the other, don’t you know? Microsoft is basically Windows. The make money in servers with Widows servers. They make money in client OS with Windows client OS. They make money in office automation with Windows compatible office automation products including server side products. They make money in games with Windows compatible games.
You struggle heroically to find an Achilles’ Heel in their structure, but year after year, they continue to prosper. Other companies also prosper and you try to paint that as a Microsoft loss somehow, but it is just a hollow wailing that no one really sees as a minus for Microsoft.
It is a money thing in commerce, of course, and you can add up all the software money to be had in all markets that you can think of and then you can see where it is going. A great deal of it is going to Microsoft, of course, and more is going that way each year. No hitch in their git-along as Dandy Don would have put it.