Linux blooms on servers: IDC

Linux had blossomed on the servers of corporate Australia, a survey of CIOs conducted by International Data Corp (IDC) has found.

IDC's survey of 330 CIOs and IT Managers across Australia and New Zealand, found that the number of organisations using Linux servers had almost doubled since 1999, to 32.4 percent. A mere 4.9 percent of respondents reported that they formally rejected the use of the open source platform after considering its use.

Given the number of organisations likely to be assessing the use of open source platform, this low rejection rate could be a telling sign about how the industry was changing, according to IDC's 2003-2004 Forecast for Management “Operations & Infrastructure”.

Linux adoption was earmarked to grow from 32.4 percent at the end 2002 to 40 percent by the close of this year, the report revealed. Growth was occurring in most industry sectors. The public sector was leading this trend, with 37.8 percent of respondents already having experience with Linux.

The study findings were supported by anecdotal reports from CIOs attending IDC's InTEP (Information Technology Experience Program) forums. InTEP members had indicated that a high level of experimentation was being carried out regarding Linux adoption, said Catherin Bennett, IDC's director of user programs.

"The findings of this report confirms growth and development activity has returned to the scene for IT, but the strong focus on ROI and cost control that we have seen over the last couple of years is certainly not leaving" said Bennett.

In addition to the Linux findings, the report found the lifetime of the corporate desktop continued to be stretched. Nearly 40 percent of organisations were now planning to retain their desktops for at least four years, a figure that was only 28 percent two years ago, said Bennett.

The finance industry appeared to be the “most reluctant” of any sector to adopt Linux. Bennett said this could reflect “greater concerns with standards and risk, or less concern with the TCO issues which is motivating many organisations to investigate Open Source solutions".