Dear Steve,
Hi, this is Francois, from Mandriva.
I"m sure we are way too small for you to have heard of us. You know, we are one of these Linux company who is working hard to make its place in the market. We publish a Linux Distro, called MandrivaLinux. Mandriva Linux 2008, our last edition, has a pretty good review and we"re proud of it. You should try it, I"m sure you"d like it. We
also happen to be one of the Linux companies that did not sign an agreement with your company (nobody"s perfect).
We recently closed a deal with the Nigerian Government. Maybe you heard about it, Steve. They were looking for an affordable hardware+software solution for their schools. The initial batch was 17,000 machines. We had a good deal to respond to their need: the Classmate PC from Intel, with a customized Mandriva Linux solution. We
presented the solution to the local government, they liked the machine, they liked our system, they liked what we offered them, especially the fact that it was open, and that we could customize it for their country and so on.
Then, your people get in the game and the deal got more competitive. I
would not say it got dirty, but someone could have said that. Your
team fought and fought again the deal, but still the customer was
happy with the CMPC and Mandriva.
We actually closed the deal, we took the order, we qualified the
software, we got the machine shipped. To conclude, we did our
job. And, the machine are being delivered right now.
Now, we hear a different story from the customer : "we shall pay
for the Mandriva Software as agreed, but we shall replace it by
Windows afterward."
Wow! I"m impressed, Steve! What have you done to these guys to make
them change their mind like this? It"s quite clear to me, and it will
be to everyone. How do you call what you just did Steve? There is
various names for it, I"m sure you know them.
Of course, I will keep fighting this one and the next one, and the
next one. You have the money, the power, and maybe we have a different
sense of ethics you and I, but I still believe that hard work, good
technology and ethics can win too.
cheers
Francois
PS: a message to our friends in Nigeria: it"s still time to do the
right thing and make the right choice, you will get lots of support
for it and excellent services!