Novell, Netscape to Form Software Venture

Novell Inc. and Netscape Communications Corp. plan to announce an agreement to form a jointly owned network software company that would take on Microsoft Corp. and IBM. Company executives said they would announce today that the new company, to be called Novonyx, will develop a version of Netscape’s SuiteSpot package of communications and collaboration software to work on Novell’s Internetware network operating system, the most popular software product for shuffling information between computers in corporate networks. Novonyx’s offerings will compete against packages of communications software from Microsoft and IBM’s Lotus Development software division, Novell and Netscape said. Until now, Provo, Utah-based Novell and Netscape, based in Mountain View, could not individually offer a complete product line to directly take on their bigger rivals.