Philippine Linux Company Promotes Free Software by Offering Rental and Lease to Own Servers

    MaiMai News - PASIG CITY, PHILIPPINES, October 03, 2006 - Philippine-based Linux company GEN Automation Technologies does their share in promoting Free Software by providing small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) the options to avail of rental and lease-to-own servers running on Open Source software.

"Our mission has always been to provide what we like to call 'the Linux advantage', specifically to the SMEs here in Metro Manila," said Patricia B. Celis, Sales & Marketing Officer. "Since small companies are oftentimes unable to afford investments in IT due to its high cost, we provided a way to go around this problem by combining Open Source software with affordable and flexible GEN packages."

These GEN packages include rental and lease-to-own payment schemes, wherein customers pay a fixed monthly billing, the latter lasting for up to 12 months. Prices cover the cost of the hardware, the configuration services of the software, and even the complete technical support and maintenance of the server throughout the rental or lease period.

"When we started in 2000, we rented out email servers for as low as Php 3,500.00 per month," said Ms. Celis. "These packages were definitely easy on the budget for SMEs."

Open Source is a collaborative way of developing software whereby the software and its source code are made freely available. An example of this is Linux, which is an open-source operating system developed and distributed under the GNU Public License. Today, the difference between having a legal Microsoft licensed server and a server running on Linux platform range from thousands of Philippine pesos to tens of thousands, which becomes impractical for small and medium sized companies.

Through such unconventional means, GEN Automation has not only helped SMEs to take advantage of the benefits of investing in technology, but has also educated these small and medium sized company owners about Open Source solutions.

Ms. Celis added, "Part of our goal is to let SMEs know they have a choice when it comes to reaping benefits from Information Technology (IT). We are happy that in the six years since we've started, it seems we have achieved this goal."

GEN Automation is a Linux specialist company based in the Philippines. For more information, please please visit http://www.gen.com.ph or contact us at (632) 9163971