Microsoft To Open Source Code To Avanade, Other Technology Integrators

While the announcement this week will center on opening up the Windows source code to one of Microsoft's own services interests, Avanade, Microsoft claims it is just one of the first technology integrators that will gain access to the source code. Microsoft owns a 49 percent stake in Avanade, a joint venture set up between Microsoft and Accenture in March of 2000.

The move to open Windows source code to integrators may be designed to appease opponents to the current settlement agreement between Microsoft and the U.S. Justice Department.

As part of the proposed antitrust settlement agreement reached with the government last October, Microsoft committed to sharing parts of the Windows API with other software markets and nodded to the creation of a three-member technical committee to oversee that process.

But opponents--attorneys general from the District of Columbia and nine hard-liner states--said they would not support the settlement as proposed and want broader, more open access to Microsoft code as well as stiffer penalties. Hearings on the remedies are scheduled to begin March 11.

Under pressure from the open source software movement, as well as the antitrust case, Microsoft last May announced a "shared source" initiative that opens more of the source code to customers and developers for examination and fixes, yet the company retains full control of its code and a commercial model of licensing.

As part of that, the company's Enterprise Source Licensing Program currently gives about 1,600 customers in 27 countries access to licenses for the Windows source code, Microsoft claims. Additionally, Microsoft Research Source Licensing provides universities and public research institutes with access to the code and the Government Source Licensing Program does the same for government institutions. Last December, for example, Microsoft announced it would make Windows XP source code available to the Federal Ministry of the Interior in Austria.

The announcement this week would extend that privilege to technology integrators, but whether the code will be handed over to services companies not in Microsoft's control remains to be seen. Microsoft will announce other extensions to the source code initiative as well.