Novell Inc commands 60% of the market for corporate network software and NetWare is used upon an estimated 67 million desktops, but to prevent Microsoft Corp ripping out its corporate heart, the company must prevent the industry moving lock, stock and barrel to Windows NT for its network solutions by brining NetWare to the internet. Yes, it should have happened eons ago; well two or three years by new CEO Eric Schmidt’s reckoning. Come September, Novell is expected to reveal its plan to wrap NetWare – which accounted for 80% of the company’s $1.3bn 1996 revenue – in a layer of internet-enabled software called Moab. An early version of Moab is due in October with production versions scheduled for early next year. Novell’s recovery is also grounded in Java, which Schmidt championed at Sun, and his bet that it will become widely used, quickly. Observers say Novell still has a couple of years before NT can do all of the things NetWare is capable of.
