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Its no secret that many people in the Linux community dislike Novells recent Microsoft partnership. To some analysts, though, the deal is a feather in Novells market cap.
Open-source activist Bruce Perens started an online petition to protest the deal. A group of people launched a Web site with a self-explanatory name, Boycott Novell. And, leading Samba developer Jeremy Allison left Novell because of the patent part of the Novell-Microsoft deal.
At least one independent institutional investment bank, First Albany, likes the deal, however. It likes it a lot.
On Jan. 17, First Albanys managing director of equity research, Mark Murphy, wrote a research note to the banks customers stating that First Albany was “upgrading our rating on the shares of NOVL [Novell] to Buy from Neutral.” By the firms rating system a Buy recommendation means that it expects the stock to have a potential return of 10 to 20 percent.
Specifically, the investment bank believes that Novell will reach a price of $9 per share. For the last six months, the stock has been hovering around $6.30 per share.