Red Hat: Gateway to open source in Latin America
Posted by: admin in Business and Politics
Julian Somodi, Red Hat GM, South America
(Credit: Matt Asay)
Latin America has tended to be one of the worst performing geographies for most software companies, generally coming in at one to four percent of total company revenues. That may be about to change.
Yesterday I had lunch with Julian Somodi, Red Hat’s general manager for South America. Somodi has one of the most exceptional backgrounds of anyone I’ve met at Red Hat. His first “job” was with Red Hat: Until then, he had always been an entrepreneur, starting and selling a range of businesses.
In fact, he started the first real Red Hat distributorship in South America and practically demanded Red Hat to open shop in the region. (I heard this from his colleagues - Somodi isn’t the type to brag of his own achievements.) He was Red Hat’s first general manager back in 2006, and has been pushing forward ever since.
News flash for Red Hat: Somodi is still each bit the entrepreneur, and is now putting his drive and ambition to work for Red Hat. It’s pretty impressive to behold. But then, for anyone that has worked with Somodi, they already know this.
Asay: Latin America has always been difficult for North American and European software companies. Between piracy and comparatively low budgets for technology, we’ve struggled to know how to do business in Latin America. You seem to see an opportunity, and have been closing some big customers like the Brazilian Federal Court. Why?
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