QNX Publishes Neutrino Source Code and Opens Development Process

News at a Glance... QNX publishes source to QNX Neutrino OS and introduces transparent development process. New hybrid software model stimulates a new movement in combining commercial-grade software and licensing with collaborative and transparent development practices. Customers and community can examine, modify, and extend QNX technology in new online portal.

OTTAWA, September 12, 2007 — In a move that revolutionizes software development practices by combining the best of the open source and commercial software domains, QNX Software Systems today announced that it is opening access to the source code of its QNX® Neutrino® realtime operating system (RTOS) under a new hybrid software licensing arrangement.

Effective immediately, QNX will make source code for its award-winning, microkernel-based OS available for download. The first source release includes the code to the QNX Neutrino microkernel, the base C library, and a variety of board support packages (BSPs) for popular embedded and computing hardware.

Not only can developers view the QNX Neutrino source code, but they can improve, modify, or extend that code for their own purposes or for the QNX community at large. They can then choose to offer back those changes to QNX Software Systems and the QNX development community or to keep their modifications private and proprietary.

New Hybrid Software Model

These changes are part of a new hybrid software model created by QNX that supports the customer’s goal of profiting from software while fueling the passion for developing it.

Access to QNX source code is free, but commercial deployments of QNX Neutrino runtime components still require royalties, and commercial developers will continue to pay for QNX Momentics® development seats. However, noncommercial developers, academic faculty members, and qualified partners will be given access to QNX development tools and runtime products at no charge.

Customer and community members will also have the ability to participate in the QNX development process, similar to projects in the open source world. Through a transparent development process, software designers at QNX will publish development plans, post builds and bug fixes, and provide moderated support to the development process. They will also collaborate with customers and the QNX community, using public forums, wikis, and source code repositories.

“With its new transparent development process, source code program, and development tool access plan, QNX is the vanguard of change in the world of commercial software development and deployment,” said Dan Dodge, chief executive officer of QNX Software Systems. “Both commercial and hobbyist developers will have unprecedented access to the ‘crown jewels’ of our software as the base for creating the next great computing innovation.”

New Community Portal

QNX has also introduced a new community portal website, called Foundry27, as the hub for its transparent development initiative. At Foundry27, customers and developers can access a wealth of resources relating to the QNX Neutrino RTOS and the QNX Momentics IDE, as well as to new community projects.

Upon completing the free registration, users identify which of three different software licenses is appropriate to their interests and gain immediate access to copies of most QNX software products, as well as to source code for many of these components.

Supporting Quotes

Advantech

David DeMint, Project Manager

“When QNX introduces their hybrid software model, we believe the development community is going to be very excited. With access to QNX Neutrino source code, developers will experience its superior microkernel architecture and proven security and stability. As one of the largest embedded computing manufacturers, we plan to work with QNX to develop board support packages for ETX, COM-Express, and a wide range of SBC systems boards. Participating in the broader QNX community reflects Advantech’s ongoing role as a leader in embedded computing.”

AMCC

Charlie Ashton, Director of Software

“We are pleased to see QNX introduce their hybrid software model. Many of our PowerPC customers already use the QNX Neutrino operating system and we expect that the new engagement model and transparent development process will increase adoption of QNX Neutrino within our customer base. The benefits of widely available source code are well understood in our market, so we look forward to a continued and growing partnership.”

Eclipse Foundation

Mike Milinkovich, Executive Director

“As one of the founding members of Eclipse, QNX as an organization has always been a very active member of our open source community. By embracing the concept of transparent development within their own companies, developers will further benefit from the technology and thought leadership that QNX has for years demonstrated as the head of our CDT Project.”

Extreme Engineering

Bret Farnum, Vice President, Sales

“By bringing the hybrid business model to the embedded market, QNX is combining the best of both the open source and commercial models. For commercial board vendors like Extreme Engineering, this hybrid model will enable us to rapidly bring support of QNX products to our customers. That’s why we’re hosting all of our QNX board support packages on the QNX Bazaar.”

Freescale Semiconductor

Raja Tabet, Director of Solutions and Enablement Technology

“As the demand from OEM customers grows for multimedia solutions, particularly in automotive, consumer networking, and wireless, QNX is a valued partner in many of our processor initiatives. This new hybrid software model will enable Freescale and the multimedia development community to work more closely with QNX and speed the development of high-performance, media-rich systems.”

National Instruments

Greg Crouch, Director of Embedded Business Development

“National Instruments has long been working to lower the barriers of entry to embedded design for a broad base of engineers, scientists, and researchers. With their new hybrid software model, QNX has become much more accessible to this large and diverse group. We are very excited about the future of our partnership in both the commercial and academic spaces.”

NuDesign

Stan Kmiec, President

“In our experience, availability of source code has allowed our customers to optimize implementations of our SNMP and CLI management agent tools and solutions. Gaining similar visibility into QNX's runtime components will not only help customer optimizations but will accelerate our own ability to integrate our products with theirs. This initiative will mesh the know-how and best initiatives of the user community with development programs at both QNX and NuDesign. As a result, I foresee many benefits for our joint customers going forward.”

Renesas Technology Corp

Tsutomu Miki, General Manager,

Automotive Semiconductor Business Unit, MCU business group “The availability of QNX’s source code will enable developers to harness the power of the QNX Neutrino kernel when bringing the latest innovations built on Renesas platforms to market reliably and cost effectively. By introducing transparent development in a hybrid software model, QNX is fostering an environment that combines the best of commercial and open source software innovation.”

About QNX Software Systems QNX Software Systems, a Harman International company (NYSE: HAR), is the industry leader in realtime, embedded OS technology. The component-based architectures of the QNX® Neutrino® RTOS and QNX Momentics® development suite together provide the industry’s most reliable and scalable framework for building innovative, high-performance embedded systems. Global leaders such as Cisco, DaimlerChrysler, General Electric, Lockheed Martin, and Siemens depend on QNX technology for network routers, medical instruments, vehicle telematics units, security and defense systems, industrial robotics, and other mission- or life-critical applications. Founded in 1980, QNX Software Systems is headquartered in Ottawa, Canada, and distributes products in over 100 countries worldwide. Visit www.qnx.com.

Editorial Contacts

Paul Leroux

QNX Software Systems

+1 613 591-0931

paull@qnx.com