Red Hat announced that Channel Insider has named Red Hat Enterprise Linux the top server operating system in its 2008 Product of the Year awards. Winners exemplify attributes of high importance to the channel including value, support and profit potential. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is a platform for open source computing, coupling the innovation of open source technology and the stability of a true enterprise-class platform.

As the winner in the Server Operating Systems category, Red Hat Enterprise Linux was selected by a group of value added resellers (VARs) that sell a range of solutions and vary in size. Channel Insider polled the VARs to rank products based on criteria, including familiarity with the product, opportunity for after-market sales, product profit potential, impact of the product on the technology market as a whole and the product vendor's service and support. Second place and third place in the Server Operating Systems category behind Red Hat Enterprise Linux were awarded to Sun Microsystems Solaris 10 and Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 SPI respectively.

“We continue to see strong interest for Red Hat Enterprise Linux as a cost-effective solution that provides value and drives growth on a budget without compromising capability,” said Chris Pyle, president and CEO of Champion Solutions Group, a Red Hat Advanced Business Partner. “We appreciate that Red Hat continues to invest in the channel, allowing us to better meet our customers' needs.”

Channel sales provided 54 percent of Red Hat's revenue in its fiscal quarter ending February 29, 2008, and the company doubled its business through traditional channels including VARs and system integrators during its fiscal year ending on that date. Red Hat has also more than doubled the number of its Advanced Business Partners in the last year. Advanced Business Partners receive direct access to Red Hat sales, pre-sales, support and marketing staff, as well as other substantial benefits to enable rapid growth of the partners' Linux and open source solutions portfolio.

“We are very honored to receive the award for best server operating system given the depth of expertise Channel Insider provides professionals in the channel community,” said Mark Enzweiler, vice president, North America channels at Red Hat. “We continue to focus on becoming a channel-centric company and are seeing increased sales across the channel for Red Hat Enterprise Linux and JBoss Enterprise Middleware solutions.”

Recently, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 was recognized by SearchEnterpriseLinux.com as Product of the Year in the Linux Server Distributions category for leadership in virtualization. The operating system was also recognized as a 2008 Product of the Year by Datamation in the Enterprise Linux category, and was named Best Open Source Solution in the 2008 SIIA Codie Awards.