Oliver Diedrich

Born in 1963, Oliver Diedrich is a senior editor at c't magazine, where he is responsible for Linux, open source and related issues. He is also editor-in-chief of the online publication "heise open" which is focused on enterprise usage of open source software. Since 1998, he has been watching the rise of Linux from a hacker's toy to a platform for mission-critical applications and the evolution of open source solutions from the playground into data centers. Before he began working at Heise Zeitschriften Verlag, he was a researcher in the neurophysiologic foundations of emotions.

Open Source Usage in the Enterprise

There are many different reasons why enterprises use open source software. Based on several case studies, I will outline some of these reasons.

Cost savings. DB Systems, the IT service provider of the Deutsche Bahn (German Railroads), decided already in 2003 to use Linux as a strategic IT platform. The switch from Solaris machines to x86 servers with Linux saved about half of the costs for hardware and licenses which account for 40 percent of the total costs.

Flexibility. In order to build a flexible SOA architecture without any vendor lock-in, Union Investment decided to use only software components that comply to open standards. The result: a complex enterprise application integration infrastructure built with open source components which delivers the needed flexibility.

Control. Software in airplanes must be supported for 30 years and more. No software vendor guarantees the availability of his development tools for such a long period. Airbus therefore founded TOPCASED, a project devoted to the development of an open source toolkit for the development of critical applications and systems.

Security. The Nordrheinische Ärzteversorgung implemented a smartcard authentification system based on open source, because its security needs could not be fulfilled by any ready-made solution in the market.