Novell Pursues Plan To Link 1 Billion People Worldwide Network Software Giant Trying To Stay Step Ahead Of Microsoft

The information superhighway connecting millions of computers around the globe is big - but it’s peanuts compared to the future in the mind of Bob Frankenberg, head of Novell Inc.

Frankenberg wants his company, the industry leader in software that connects computers via local networks, to tie together 1 billion people and the devices they use every day - cars, phones, even vending machines - by the end of the decade.

Frankenberg, Novell’s chairman, president and chief executive officer, calls his company’s long-term strategy “pervasive computing.”

It is an ambitious undertaking, but not out of the question for a company that owns the market for network-operating systems almost as much as Microsoft dominates the market for PC operating systems.

Local area networks running on Novell software already handle much more data every day than the Internet. Novell’s main product, called Netware, represents 60 percent to 70 percent of the installed base and sales of networking software, a market share roughly 10 times that of Microsoft’s Windows NT.

Microsoft, which had sales of $4.65 billion in its latest fiscal year (more than twice the sales of Novell) has long dominated desktop computer operating systems, thanks to MSDOS and Windows. In the past few years, the Redmond, Wash., giant has taken the lead in applications programs such as word processors, spreadsheets and databases.

So far, Microsoft has been frustrated in its desire to gain a large share of networking software.

However, Novell’s lead is hardly safe from the ambitions of Microsoft, whose sheer size enables it to write the rules for the computer industry.

“If you underestimate the ocean, or you underestimate Microsoft, either way you are in great danger,” said William Donahoo, director of product marketing for Novell and a former boxer.

Many software companies for the past dozen years have found themselves in the ring with Microsoft. And many have bitten the dust as Microsoft moved into their territories and established itself as the leader.

Eleven months ago, Novell hired Frankenberg, formerly head of the PC division of Hewlett-Packard, to make sure Novell doesn’t eventually wind up on the cutting-room floor.

His long-term vision is to make possible a network for “connecting people with other people and the information they need, enabling them to act on it anytime, anyplace.”

By the year 2000, Novell wants to provide software that can connect every microchip in every device with any other chip in any other device, as if those devices were parts of a single system.

“We’re on a path not too dissimilar to the development of the automobile or electricity, where this new technology just becomes part of everybody’s daily life, something that we just take for granted,” said Frankenberg.

Analysts see a bright future for Novell.

“They will continue to do well in networking software, and their application programs like word processing are getting good acceptance,” said Wendy Abramowitz, an analyst at Argus Research in New York.

Meanwhile, Frankenberg pursues his vision but worries about falling into a “vision trap.”

“I think the biggest danger we face is having a vision that takes five years to carry out and the temptation is to leap to the other end of it instead of meeting users’ requirements today,” he said.