Red Hat rings NYSE bell

Microsoft chairman Bill Gates once likened the open source movement to communism, but there was little evidence of that on Tuesday when Linux specialist Red Hat took over the New York Stock Exchange.

Red Hat's chief executive Matthew Szulik was on hand to ring the Exchange bell to announce the beginning of the day's trading at the $23tr exchange and announce that his company was now listed on the NYSE, rather than its previous home on the Nasdaq.

Szulik said: "It's been a long time coming and great honour for our shareholders. The global recognition of the NYSE and Red Hat make a great combination."

He added that large companies, whether they are a stock exchange, a pharmaceutical company or a government agency, are all looking to drive down the costs of computing and increase the security and reliability of their offerings.

"Open source is proving to be a better-quality product at the lowest possible price for the consumer," he said.

Red Hat has had to contend with some aggressive moves by its competitors of late, including an announcement by Oracle that it would effectively be releasing its own version of Red Hat's Linux server operating system, and Linux distributor Novell's controversial tie-up with Microsoft.

Andrew Donoghue writes for ZDNet UK.