Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?

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Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?
by anony-mouse on Monday 28/Jan/2008, @09:08

i've been following TT since their IPO and they haven't had a single financial report which stated that they were profitable. their turnover increased well (which is usually what counts) but still.

you can see it yourself in the q3 2007 report at

http://dist.trolltech.com/pdf/Q3finalreport2007.pdf

- 'The loss before tax was NOK 4.6 million in the third quarter 2007'
- 'For the first nine months of 2007, the loss before tax was NOK 26.1 million and the net loss after tax NOK 31.0 million'

i think it's crystal clear that this is a purely strategic acquisition and whoever says that TT can just keep going on as they always did except that they have a lot more resources plainly doesn't understand how businesses work at this scale (thinking about the comment of 'zack rusin').

TT is interesting because of a nice engineering division but after the deal it's entirely up to Nokia what those people are working on. if Nokia decides that the manpower is more useful to them when working on embedded stuff instead of KDE stuff, then that's the last word.

some people never understand when it's time to drop the romantic hacker mentality and realize what it means to be working for (and adjusting to the preferences of) a highly profitable and very tough global enterprise like Nokia.

Related Links

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Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?
by SadEagle on Monday 28/Jan/2008, @10:59

I might be mistaken, but I vaguely recall TT being profitable pre-IPO. It certainly wouldn't be surprising to see a company that went public push for expansion and growth over immediate profits, given the infusion of capital the IPO produces..

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Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?
by Aaron Seigo on Monday 28/Jan/2008, @14:48

yes, acquisitions, restructurings and hiring is a bitch to the bottom line when using GAAP methods.

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Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?
by Leo S on Monday 28/Jan/2008, @17:22

Huh. You're right. What the heck. I wonder why I thought that they were making a profit. That's... disturbing. When they were privately owned they must have made money, and lately they seem to be spending more and more, so I assumed they were in decent shape.

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Re: Will the FreeQt foundation actually work?
by Knut Yrvin on Monday 28/Jan/2008, @19:44

The stock exchange Q3 report also says: Positive EBITDA[1] of NOK 0.3 million. Sales has increased in the period, the report says. This shows that Trolltech is heading for profitability after a period of heavy investment.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EBITDA

When it comes to your "romantic hacker mentality" theory, science says something else. For years now researchers has studied the phenomena of free, libre and open source software. One such study is the Free/Libre and Open Source Software: Survey and Study. The study reports:

Learn and develop new skills, and share knowledge and skills are major motivations for free software developers. The study[2] shows that the free software community is a rather young and predominantly male community with a strong professional background in the IT sector and a high educational level.

2. http://www.infonomics.nl/FLOSS/report/Final4.htm

Trolltech's relation to KDE are well known. At the KDE 4 launch Haavard Nord presented how the relationship was from Trolltech's part:

3. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2866967248993401461

Finally, Nokia embraces open source technology and will take further the open source development culture found in Trolltech. FreeQt foundation is being maintained to guarantee the continued freedom of the toolkit KDE depends upon. Chief Trolls and Nokia VP are now asking for ideas and comments on improving their relationship with the open source community.

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Smoke and Mirrors?
by The Badger on Tuesday 29/Jan/2008, @02:54

"Finally, Nokia embraces open source technology"

News to Maemo developers, I'm sure.

"Chief Trolls and Nokia VP are now asking for ideas and comments on improving their relationship with the open source community."

Let's take a look at the first item on the agenda:

http://www.google.com/search?q=Nokia+software+patents

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