Red Hat CEO: We haven't done a good enough job as an industry leader, or project leader
Only three months into the job, newly named Red Hat President and CEO Jim Whitehurst is ready to talk about what he sees as the Linux company's big flaws.
No doubt, Red Hat is the leading open source company but ''I don't think we've done a good enough job" of leading the industry, the former Delta Airlines COO said.
'If you look at Red hat, we cast a pretty wide shadow ... we are in virtually all Fortune 500 companies in the US and represent 80 percent share of the paid Llnux business,'' he said, noting that the Raleigh, NC company is great at customer service but does not act like the 'defining technology company of the 21st centry' that it is.
"We do a lousy job of getting enterprises involved in the community," Whitehurst said, adding that they have begun some projects such as one aimed at getting more community involvement in building management tools around virtualization but there's much more to do. "We have to do a better job of involving the community, even if we own the operating system 100 percent lock stock and barrel."
Whitehurst also said Red Hat will continue making acquisitions but is 'narrowing its aperture" on enterprise infrastructure companies that complement its core business.
