Linaro Adds High-Powered Advisers

Linaro expanded its roster of high-powered friends with the addition of Canonical, GENIVI, HP, LiMo Foundation, and MontaVista Software to its advisory panel.

The not-for-profit organization aims to make the development of embedded open source easier and faster. The group's five newest advisors will help guide the Linaro Technical Steering Committee (TSC) on industry needs designed to facilitate the alignment of requirements, according to Linaro.

"Having HP, Canonical, GENIVI, LiMo Foundation, and MontaVista Software as advisors to our Technical Steering Committee will help us to make the best decisions on resource deployment, for the benefit of both our members and the open source community," said George Grey, CEO of Linaro. "We will continue to build extensive relationships with the electronics industry and open source communities to ensure our engineering is responsive to industry needs and is widely deployed."

Linaro focuses on accelerating innovation among software developers involved in system-on-chip (SoC) designs, including the increasing Linux-based, always-connected, always-on devices. Having a stabilized and optimized software base and tools makes it easier, faster, and more cost-effective for developers to create high-performance, efficient consumer devices, Linaro said. By eliminating the need to focus on non-differentiating software, developers can focus their efforts on product innovation, the organization said.

"Shortening development time, getting products to market quickly, and reducing development costs for embedded Linux based products are key goals for both Linaro and GENIVI," said Graham Smethurst, president of GENIVI.

Linaro -- which was founded in June by ARM, IBM, Samsung, ST-Ericsson, Freescale, and Texas Instruments -- has about 70 engineers, and expects to grow to slightly fewer than 100, according to the organization.