Attachmate intends to revitalize the sales and technical development of the end-user computing products that it acquired when it purchased Novell, such as those for virtualization and enterprise collaboration.
In general, Novell end-user computing products, which include Zenworks, Groupwise, File Management Suite, Open Enterprise Server and Vibe, could perform much better in the market and have untapped technical potential, according to the executive taking the reins of the Novell business.
"Novell technology wasn't getting the attention it needed and deserved. We're going to give it that attention," said Bob Flynn, a veteran Attachmate official whose appointment as Novell business unit President and General Manager was announced on Wednesday.
The headquarters for the Novell business unit will be moved from Waltham, Massachusetts, to Novell's original base in Provo, Utah.
Attachmate has three other autonomous business units: one specifically for Novell's Suse open source OS, another one for the NetIQ family of systems management tools and a fourth one for Attachmate products for areas like terminal emulation, legacy modernization and enterprise fraud management. Flynn is also president and general manager of the Attachmate business unit.
The Suse business unit is based in Nuremberg, Germany and led by President and General Manager Nils Brauckmann.
Novell's identity management, security and data center administration products will be handled by the NetIQ unit.
Novell products now under the NetIQ unit include Identity Manager, Cloud Security Service, Sentinel, Cloud Manager and Operations Center. NetIQ, based in Houston, is led by President and General Manager Jay Gardner.
Gardner, Brauckmann and Flynn all report to Jeff Hawn, chairman and CEO of The Attachmate Group, a holding company that oversees the four main business units.
Segmenting the company's product portfolio into four units will result in a more effective and streamlined effort, Flynn said. In the case of the Novell unit specifically, "this lets us manage and focus on that business much more clearly and with a good line of sight from product development to sales," he said.
"That way we can manage all that tightly together and re-initiate the value and power of those Novell technologies," he added.
The implementation of this new corporate structure with the four units under the umbrella of The Attachmate Group also involves layoffs, but Flynn didn't have specifics of how many people are losing their jobs.
Flynn has been with Attachmate since 1998.
Attachmate agreed to buy Novell in November 2010 and completed the $2.2 billion acquisition last month, while Novell senior executives, including its CEO Ron Hovsepian, left.
Attachmate officials have said repeatedly since November that the company plans to invest in Novell products, as well as follow through on existing roadmaps and contractual agreements.