Ariel’s Playground & Toy Factory

Would like to share this news about the progress we’re making in the Philippines as regards Free and Open Source Software. Thanks to Roli for sharing.

From the article: Open source adoption still strong in RP
By Alexander Villafania
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 18:34:00 10/05/2009
http://technology.inquirer.net/infotech/infotech/view/20091005-228524/Open-source-adoption-still-strong-in-RP

MANILA, Philippines – Open source software development, particularly Linux, is seen to have a strong following in Asia Pacific as companies look to incorporate virtualization and cloud computing in their IT infrastructure.

New approaches to IT infrastructure building include managed services and software-as-a-service, which make use of third-party applications provider.

For end-users, these reduce the need for capital and operational expenditures and allow companies to focus more on their core businesses.

“It’s already obvious that open source, cloud computing and virtualization have done a lot for companies in the Asian region. But what about the complexities of implementing these, are they ready?” asked Red Hat Asia Pacific President Gery Messer.

Messer was in the Philippines recently to talk to customers about Red Hat’s latest services. But more than a product pitch, Messer also spoke of trends in open source computing amid the rise of cloud computing and virtualization.

The current economic crisis, Messer said, has somewhat sped up the adoption of open source, cloud computing and virtualization, which helped create a more streamlined system that won’t take up time, physical space, and man hours to manage.

Also, he noted a growing trend is on managed services delivered through telecommunications providers that have their own data centers. This growth is also accelerated by the economic crisis with company budgets slashed to curtail additional expenses and losses.

“Companies now only want to pay for what they are currently using, not what they think they’d be using in the future,” Messer said.

According to a Red Hat study published in April this year, the Philippines ranked 67th out of 75 countries that had overall robust open source activity.

The Philippines, meanwhile, ranked 20th in terms of open source activity in the government sector, largely due to many government-related IT projects running on open source.