This week PC/OpenSystems LLC made some radical announcements and changes regarding their hardware and software policies and we will be discussing that with the lead system designer and CEO, Roberto J. Dohnert.
Q) Good evening Roberto how are things going?
A) Good.
Q) How hectic was today?
A) Whenever we have a major release its always hectic especially with this one because this has been worked on since September 2016.
Q) So what happened to netOS? There was a lot of disappointment that that release was scrubbed.
A) Back in October of 2016 we put out our new road-map and in there we showed the merging of the projects. So netOS was not scrubbed it was merged. You still have the same software and the same features that were present in netOS. Like any other software project we looked at our resources and we were paying for two development teams. Basically two different teams doing the exact same thing so we decided to merge the teams. The reason it took us 8 months is because we had to merge two different development tree's into one and that's a lot of work.
Q) Hardware question, why Dell and not Lenovo or stick with ACER?
A) When we looked for hardware we looked into our target segment. Education, enterprise and consumer and Dell by far has the highest visibility. Dell unlike ACER also had the ability to ship the fastest and in bulk. So its an awesome experience. Now this is not a shot at ACER. ACER makes good products but ACER is more a consumer company than an Enterprise company and for what they do they do an awesome job. BTW their Chromebooks are really good and that's why we still sell the ACER Chromebooks. In that segment they fit and fit very well.
Q) You also said price had nothing to do with the decision. What did you mean by that?
A) When we talked with our education and business customers the message was simple. They don't care about price as much as they care about quality, durability and availability. We also have to look at whats on their buying list. When you look at Dell, they are pretty much on everyone's buying list. They are one of the top brands if not the top brand. Lenovo is #2 and HP is #3. ACER is the top of the list for, once again, Chromebooks but not for general desktops and servers. Customers want their systems within 14 days not in a month and a half. With a 20 system order we were getting 10 through ACER and having to go to Walmart and Best Buy to get the rest and that's no way to run a business and that's not what customers want. We just fulfilled a 30 system order and with Dell they had all the systems to us in 4 days.
Q) I noticed some of the systems we offer are a tad on the premium side. What makes our systems cost more? Are they a value when customers can just go to Amazon and buy it for much cheaper?
A) Well what makes us different from our competitors is that our systems come with a 4 year extended warranty out of box on all desktop hardware and a 3 year extended warranty out of box on portable systems. All systems also come with a UPS system. Our competitors charge a lot more for what comes as standard on systems you order from us. Are we a bit more expensive? Yes but look at what comes with it.
Q) I notice we offer many All-in-one systems and very few traditional desktop PC's. Are we essentially copying Apple or is this a trend?
A) Its actually a trend. When we did our customer studies we asked them what systems did they want the most. All-in-ones were at the top of the list along with notebooks. Some pro customers wanted traditional desktop systems for the expandable options. So we offer the best systems for what our customers want. Copying Apple had nothing to do with the decision.
Q) Black Lab Linux was considered the crown jewel of the company and it used to be a major revenue source for PC/OpenSystems. What changed?
A) Once again we looked at sales reports and looked at customers. Hardware sales are on the rise. Software sales are on the decline. People no longer have to buy Windows systems and wipe out Windows and install Linux. With System 76, Dell, Pogo Linux and others Linux now comes as the default OS on systems shipped from the factory. We were shipping a lot of hardware units a month and less physical copies of Black Lab Linux. So we made the decision with our enterprise versions; lets just give it away for free and sell hardware and support subscriptions. It also allows more eyeballs on our products which is also very important in our industry.
Q) How do you plan to compete against hundreds of thousands of Linux distributions?
A) Well if you look at the community itself you have hundreds of thousands of distributions. If you look at the business and education markets you have 5 commercial distributions. Red Hat, SUSE, Oracle, Black Lab, and some Ubuntu. In the education market you have Red Hat, Black Lab and Chrome OS. We took a tour of a clients site recently. It was a US government research facility and they use a lot of Linux and they don't just use one. You see SUSE on the IBM z mainframes, Red Hat on the servers, and they use Black Lab on the desktop and that's what they needed. They needed a distribution focused on the enterprise desktop. Not a server distribution with a half baked workstation option. Customers want a distribution that they can stick on a developers laptop and take the same distribution and stick it on an administrators desktop and a secretaries desktop and call it a day. Red Hat, Oracle and SUSE are great on the server. They are award winning. Yet not so much on a desktop. The two community distributions that I have seen in business that don't have a focus on enterprise is CentOS and Gentoo and they are used for specific reasons.
Q) Chrome OS as you know has a major presence in education. How do you successfully compete with a total cloud offering?
A) If you look at Chrome OS, its actually quite interesting. Its not new technology. Its a client server solution. The same we saw in the 1980's and the 1990's but it has a prettier user interface. It has a much wider reach as well. In the 80's and 90's you were restricted to what was running in the basement where now you can reach out across the internet. But, its what customers want and we sell Chrome devices, we create applications for it. But some customers are not comfortable with web only storage and they aren't OK with their work not being on site. Chrome OS also lacks traditional client side applications and some of the popular Linux titles aren't there. With Black Lab Enterprise for Education you can run traditional and popular titles and web based applications and your data is stored on the web or locally. Its the customers choice. Some customers want that flexibility, some want Chromebooks and we are glad to be able to offer both.
Q) What made the team standardize on the GNOME desktop? Why not XFCE, why not MATE, why not KDE or the others?
A) Because its what customers wanted. If you look at the major distributions in enterprise and education they standardize on the GNOME desktop. We delivered releases based on different desktop options but customers always came back to GNOME. Customers can install whatever desktop they wish and for embedded systems we offer DWM on the same ISO. But we are here for the customers and what they want. Not what we want.
Q) We are primarily a desktop company. Black Lab Linux and Black Lab Enterprise Linux are desktop distributions. So whats Black Lab Server? and who is the target audience for Black Lab Server?
A) We originally just had desktop distributions only. Customers came to us and said they needed a server solution. They didn't want to go to Red Hat or SUSE and pay thousands of dollars and they wanted something that we could service and support. So we created Black Lab Server which is more of a small or medium sized solution and we have seen an uptick in that product in education. You wont see it on mainframes and you wont see it in racks of servers in Googles data centers.
Q) The support options. Black Lab Enterprise Linux is now available for free under whats called the self support umbrella. Yet customers can buy a support subscription. What value does a support subscription bring?
A) With self support you get your support through our forums, social media and community. With the support subscription you get 12 months of phone and e-mail support. You get an option of onsite or remote installation, management and deployment. When you purchase the unlimited facility license you also get the option of a custom spin generation. We create a custom spin for you that includes the applications that you want, desktop styling and more. So yes we bring tons of value to our support subscriptions.
Q) Can users contribute to Black Lab Linux and Black Lab Enterprise Linux?
A) Users can contribute whatever they want. If they want to donate to us, use the donate button on the website, if they want to donate hardware, contribute code or artwork contact support@pc-opensystems.com if they want to contribute documentation contact Rich Dennis, rdennis@pc-opensystems.com
Q) Thank you very much for taking time out to speak to us. Where can users and potential customers get more information?
A) Your welcome and customers and users can get more information about software and hardware from the website.
http://www.pc-opensystems.com
http://www.blacklablinux.org
