美国当地时间2007年3月17日，每年一度的Novell BrainShare展会在美国犹他州盐湖城召开，在发布开幕致辞的时候，Novell CEO Ron Hovsepian就不停的强调Novell公司和微软公司的合作，称这将改变Novell公司的生存和发展。
在发言中，他还强调，Novell的这一切变化都是从客户的角度出发的，所有这一切都是客户利益驱动的，为的使客户的IT生活更加轻松，客户才是重点。
在接下来的发言中，Novell公司的客户至上论调一直都不停的被重复，虽说有自由软件用户抗议Novell和微软的合作，但是Hovsepian并不表示关心，他所关心的是Novell公司的合作伙伴和客户。
在整个上午的发言致辞中，Novell公司和微软公司合作有害无弊的思想一直都在流露。其中有一个问答场景的活动是有Novell腹中和CTO Jeff Jaffe和微软首席研发官员Craig Mundie共同完成的，他们通过问答的方式来强调他们发言的主题，那就是，企业IT环境中互操作性和虚拟化技术将对两家公司产生深远影响，并且Novell公司和微软公司将通过合作，将Linux和windows的整合做的更好。
在Jaffe的眼里，未来世界的操作系统将只有两个，那就是Linux和Windows，Linux将是通用平台，在Linux平台上(SESE Enterprise Server)和Windows平台上，将运行其他虚拟操作系统，比如其他版本的Linux或者Netware。用户可不需要太多的操作系统，他们只需要开源软件来构建通用的代码平台。
Salt Lake City -- Microsoft and Novell's partnership is more than the cosmetic addition of Microsoft as a platinum partner to Novell's annual BrainShare partner conference. Novell CEO Ron Hovsepian said during his keynote speech that the company's recent partnership with Microsoft represented an "ecosystem change" for Novell.
Hovsepian went on to say that "This deal was done for one reason – the customer. This was all about driving customers to make their lives easier, and about interoperability. This is a customer-driven move and we will remain customer focused."
This customer focus theme was repeated over and over again. While some free-software fans oppose the Novell/Microsoft partnership, Hovsepian was not addressing their concerns. He was addressing what he believes to be the concerns of Novell's partners and their customers.
In the next sections of the morning keynote session, the benefits of the Microsoft/Novell deal were reiterated over and over again. Novell VP and CTO Jeff Jaffe and Microsoft's chief research and strategy officer Craig Mundie appeared together on the tradeshow stage and engaged in a question and answer section. Their theme: how interoperability and virtualization were key to the future of both companies and how the pair would work together so that Linux and Novell's management applications and Microsoft's server and management could work together.
Jaffe foresees a world with two operating systems: Linux and Windows. In his vision of the future, Linux will become the universal platform. On top of SLES (SUSE Linux Enterprise Server), the Windows server operating systems, NetWare and other versions of Linux will run as virtualized operating system. "Customers don't need many operating systems," said Jaffe. "They need open-source systems built on a common code basis."
He went on to say that Novell is putting its efforts behind Linux and the JES (Java Enterprise Services), while Microsoft is, of course, focusing on Windows and .NET. But, he continued, once a company has made a decision on which operating system and development platform it will use, Novell intends to provide the best possible network management tools and services for both systems.
In fact, Jaffe said that with the just-announced OES (Open Enterprise Server) 2.0, Novell will be providing Windows domain services. In addition, with Novell's ZENworks, "We will be the best managers for Microsoft's Vista desktop systems."
Mundie, of course, sees it somewhat differently, but he also sees that Windows Servers' operating systems need to support Linux in virtualization. Then, during technical demonstrations, the two companies showed how, in just three months since they begin their partnership, they have already been successful in running SLES on top of Longhorn, the next generation of Windows Server, and Server 2003 on SLES.
The companies also showed that they are well on their way toward providing identity and security management systems that will work together. In their demonstrations, the pair showed that administrators can look forward to using Microsoft's AD (Active Directory) and Novell's eDirectory to manage both Linux and Windows networks.
Novell executives said that its customers want the best of both Linux and Windows with interoperability and virtualization making it possible to use both operating systems at the same time. And that, as this morning demos showed, is exactly what Novell and Microsoft have been working on in recent months.
