Hewlett-Packard co. is striking back at Sun Microsystems Inc., which in July rolled out its HP Away program aimed at luring AlphaServer customers. HP early this month introduced its own migration program for Sun customers looking to move from the Solaris platform to Linux.
HP, of Palo Alto, Calif., is offering Sun users up to $25,000 in application porting and redeployment costs to make the transfer. HP officials said there has been a lot of interest from customers looking to make the switch, particularly since the company a few weeks ago started offering an indemnity program protecting customers from any legal problems involving The SCO Groups patent infringement claims.
Although the cost of migration depends on the size of the company and the number of applications that need to be ported, “for the vast majority of customers, [$25,000] could mean the difference between sitting on the fence and jumping to the other side and saying, Lets do it,” said Martin Fink, vice president of Linux for HP, in Fort Collins, Colo.
Sun customers who take advantage of the HP program, which runs until Dec. 31, are offered a free assessment of migration needs for up to three applications and the free porting of one application. Customers also can use an Intel Corp.-based ProLiant server for 30 days to test the migration and a free HP StorageWorks storage area network assessment.
Officials with Sun, of Santa Clara, Calif., characterized HPs initiative as a desperate push by the companys embattled Enterprise Systems Group and pointed out that Sun already offers customers Linux platforms. They also questioned whether HPs focus on Linux is the result of a lack of commitment to its HP-UX operating system.