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Comment by bmicklea | Hacker News Reader

Red Hat's business model and open culture isn't changing. We will remain independent and I look at this as an opportunity for more people to engage with our stellar support and field teams.

For some context you can read the email our CEO sent out to the whole company today: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/jim-whitehurst-email-red-hatt...

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I remember a very similar email from my company's CEO during a merger. Within months he had retired with millions and everything had changed. I sincerely wish Red Hat and your work doesn't fall victim to a similar fate, but IBM literally owns you as of today.

That sort of depends on whether the CEO will remain in the company or not, and which incentives he has to continue to perform

The CEO doesn't have full control over everything. Plenty can (and did) change even without a change in the CEO. Again - they are literally owned by IBM now. I'd be optimistic if Red Hat really were to be fully independent with respect to products. But unless IBM made this investment purely as a financial strategy, they will absolutely begin interfering.

Wish you luck, but strongly suggest you remain realistic about how this dance goes, simply for your own sake.

Thing is, IBM has been around for a long time and has a long history of acquisitions. They've done it enough that there's a process. My suggestion would be to go through this list and decide which one looks most like the situation in which you find yourself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisitio...

If you were feeling like a little research, you could probably even find the names of some folks in a job role like yours who were there at the time and see what happened to them post-acquisition.

The only one that looks remotely similar is PWC consulting.

I think there's some confusion here: your company just got bought, which means that you stopped being independent.

"Red Hat's business model and open culture isn't changing. We will remain independent "

Oh, man, wouldn't it be pretty to think so?

In all seriousness, this is an INSANELY naive statement. It doesn't matter what IBM says, and it matters less what the Red Hat CEO says. You got bought. They can, and will, do whatever they want, regardless of what lip service they pay to independence or preserving culture or whatever.

They've just spent $34billion for what is essentially a culture and a customer base (all the software is open source, and the building are leased), so yes they absolutely can do whatever they want but burning it all to the ground is going to cause some interesting questions about exactly how that increased shareholder value. It could all fall apart but IBM management have a massive incentive to make it work.

Having worked for a company that got bought out for the "culture and employees", I can tell you that's a lie. You got bought out for the partnerships and technology, and everything else is a bonus. You will fall in line with the IBM culture, or you will be phased out. If you're not a salesperson, I'd suggest you spread your resume around.

No. Individual managers at IBM have strong incentives to meet their own comp plan incentives, and that's it.

Can you point to any acquisition EVER where the acquired company remained "independent" for a meaningful amount of time? Or where the smaller firm retained their own culture? It doesn't happen.

This seems like wishful thinking. These are exactly the same things that are always said. You may be fine for a few weeks, a few months, or even a few years, but IBM will inevitably interfere enough to cause a serious culture shift (or collapse).

> Red Hat's business model and open culture isn't changing.

The old management maxim will hold true:

If nothing will change, why fuck with the formula?

Of course Redhat under Big Blue will change, considerably.

Red Hat culture hasn't been anything to brag about. They basically maintain an outdated version of Linux that companies only pay for to get support and shift liability, but there is nothing innovative about Red Hat Linux.

I guess that's how it looks for students.

Ex-IBMer here...

I'd really suggest finding one of your colleagues that's seen IBM's track record with acquisitions and pick their brain a bit. They'll have much more relevant information for you than your old CEO.

You're in for a surprise then...

Oh honey... You may get 2-3 good years, but IBM VPs will swarm in and try to kingdom build -- its only a matter of time.

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