The following is a joint statement from openSUSE Board Members Pascal Bleser and Bryen Yunashko.

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As you may know, recently Novell made the decision to reduce the workforce in their organization in the wake of our current economic outlook which is affecting everyone globally in all sectors of life. Unfortunately, this has also impacted some members of the openSUSE Community who were employed by Novell when, earlier this week, they were laid off.

We hear about layoffs every day now. Most of us have been hit by layoffs in recent times, if not personally, then friends and family. The sadness we feel for our fellow community members is just as strong and our hearts go out to them in this time.

Some people have approached us publicly and privately and asked us what this means for the future of openSUSE. In fact, openSUSE is a community project driven both by Novell and the Community at large. Within this project, we make no distinction between Novell and non-Novell employees. As such, those laid off are still important and vital members of our Project, and we look forward to the opportunity to continue working with them as fellow members for the good of our community, our distribution and for Free and Opensource software at large.

Our observations over the past week convince us that Novell is still committed to the openSUSE Project. It is also our observation that the community as a whole remains active, vibrant and motivated. Our colleagues employed by Novell have assured us that while there is some frustrations and disappointment, they and the company are still as committed as ever to the openSUSE Project.

As we have mentioned, these are difficult times for everyone and hard decisions have been made by Novell. While we cannot speak for Novell and the reasons behind its decisions, we do take offense to those outside our community who have decided to exploit the hardship of our fellow community members in these trying economic times for their own personal gain in their misguided rants against the Project and misinterpreted portrayals to the general public.

We'd like to wish our friends good luck with their respective careers, hoping they will soon find another job, and also hoping that their contributions, their expertise and their commitment for the openSUSE Project will sustain not just for the sake of it, but also and foremost, because they're our friends.

Pascal Bleser openSUSE Board Member

Bryen Yunashko openSUSE Board Member