LinuxAsia 2006: International Convention on Open Source Computing Begins in Delhi

International Convention on Open Source Computing Begins in Delhi

LinuxAsia 2006 Focuses on “Building an Open Knowledge Society”

New Delhi, February 8, 2006: The annual LinuxAsia 2006, the regions premier Open Source Software (OSS) Conference and expo opened in New Delhi today. The three-day conference brings together industry leaders, academics, government and policy makers, students and members of the Open Source community from around the world.

Inaugurating the Conference, Dr. Deepak Phatak, Chair Professor at IIT Mumbai explained that Open Systems are the only way to empower a larger community which can drive innovation and prosperity. In his keynote address, Dr. Phatak challenged that the time has arrived to take the OSS movement forward in the value chain. This can happen through the active collaboration of technology companies, entrepreneurs, service providers and developers. Summits like LinuxAsia bring together the larger community, and are critical for pooling the energies of all in building India into an information society based on open knowledge. He called upon leaders of the Indian software industry to earmark resources to grow the Open Systems ecosystem.

India is emerging as the hottest Asian market for Open Source Sofware (OSS) with rapid strides being made in OSS adoption in many sectors of industry, education, enterprise and government, as well as in the development of Open Source applications. The Rs 600 crore market of open source software is now growing at a compounded annual growth rate of 35-40 percent and presents an exciting scenario for all stakeholders. Indian businesses are expected to spend $25.12 billion on information technology in 2006 – a more than 23.7 percent rise over the past year. And out of this, the Open Source Software market can look for a 40-50 per cent share.

Giving a strong business perspective at the Conference, Mr. Javed Tapia, President, RedHat India, the leading vendor of OS-based desktops and applications said “Open Source is not only about products and solutions, but more about services and support. It is critical to showcase business success based on Open Source. Only then will the CIO’s concerns about stability and security be addressed”.

Ms. Seema Ambastha, Senior Solutions Manager of Oracle India, revealed that Oracle contributes a wide range of technologies to the Open Source ecosystem and is moving a large portion of its internal business processing to Open Source. From a business perspective, Open Source solutions provide Oracle’s customers with the same ability to choose cost-effective technology that meet their specific needs.

Mr. Mark Shuttleworth, Linux pioneer and Guru, the first African cosmonaut and the “benevolent dictator” behind Ubuntu, delivered the afternoon keynote. Shuttleworth said that the main challenge in front of the Open Source Software development community is to establish a system of sharing that enables synchronisation of changes that developers make.
Ms. Mary Ann Fisher, IBM’s Linux Programs Executive, commented that while the interest in Open Source and Linux is encouraging, the challenge for a country like India is to convert this interest into usable and demonstrable solutions that can impact the diverse grass-root communities evolving in this country.

The LinuxAsia Conference has sessions running in four parallel tracks – the Technology Track, Industry Track, Desktop Track and the Developer Track. Leading experts, thinkers and Open Source evangelists are guiding workshops and leading discussion forums to deliberate on the imperatives for India in the practical adoption of cost-effective computing in an “IT for all” scenario. Speakers from Telecom, Government, Education, Small and Medium Enterprise, Financial Services, IT & ITES, formed the panels.

Nearly 1200 delegates and visitors from Corporate, IT, government and academics attended the conference today. The accompanying exposition had products and services majors like Oracle, Dell, Intel, HP, IBM, RedHat, CDAC and several others showing their Linux-based solutions. With Open Source solutions becoming the base for efficient delivery of e-government services, modern education and economic and information empowerment of more Indians, applications in local languages attracted most visitors at the exhibits.

About LinuxAsia 2006

Being held for the third consecutive year, LinuxAsia is the premier open source conference and expo in the region. It attracts the Linux community, serious users, government policy makers and industry across the board. The last edition of the event attracted over 2500 visitors.