Local and central government has become a key focus in the ongoing battle between Microsoft Corp and Linux vendors like Red Hat as they battle for lucrative government business and also for political approval of the open and closed source philosophies.
In order to boost its competitiveness for those lucrative contracts, Red Hat has set up the Government Business Unit, to be run by its new vice president of government sales operations, Paul Smith.
Smith was previously vice president of government operations at storage management software vendor Veritas Software Corp and will now be responsible for Red Hat’s government business worldwide.
Red Hat already has relationships with several US government departments including the Defense Department, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Patent and Trademark Office, and the DOE.
It has recently strengthened its relationship with the DOE thanks to an agreement with the DOE National Labs for the deployment of its Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system and Red Hat Network systems management technologies.
The seven-year agreement was made with the DOE National Labs CIOs and sees Red Hat Enterprise Linux being used at the various DOE National Laboratories and Technology Centers.
