Red Hat Announces Key New Appointments to its Open Source Licensing & Intellectual Property Law Team

Robert Tiller and Richard Fontana assume complementary roles as Vice President and Assistant General Counsel and Open Source Licensing and Patent Counsel

RALEIGH, CAROLINE DU NORD -

Red Hat (NYSE: RHT), the world's leading provider of open source solutions, today announced the appointment of Rob Tiller, as Vice President and Assistant General Counsel, and Richard Fontana, as Open Source Licensing and Patent Counsel.

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Tiller brings over 20 years of legal expertise to Red Hat and joins the company from Helms, Mulliss & Wicker, where he was a partner specializing in intellectual property and technology litigation, commercial litigation and antitrust. Tiller also served as a law clerk for Justice Antonin Scalia of the United States Supreme Court and for Judge Stephen Williams of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Tiller earned his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law and received his bachelor's degree from Oberlin College.

At Red Hat, Tiller will be in charge of the company's internal intellectual property team, with responsibilities covering open source licensing, copyright, patent and trademark law. In additional, Tiller will work on the development of new policies and strategies related to legal issues in open source.

Fontana most recently served as Counsel at the Software Freedom Law Center, where he represented the Free Software Foundation throughout the process of drafting version 3 of the GNU General Public License, the first update of the most widely used open source license in over 15 years. At SFLC Fontana also advised several other leading open source projects, foundations and sponsorship organizations concerning a broad range of licensing, copyright, patent, trademark, and corporate formation issues.

Before joining SFLC, Fontana was an associate at the intellectual property law firm Darby & Darby, P.C. Fontana received his J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School, earned a master's degree in computer science from Yale University and obtained his bachelor's degree from Wesleyan University.

At Red Hat, Fontana will help manage matters relating to open source licensing and assist with patent matters. He will also serve as a Red Hat liaison with the open source community on licensing matters.

"It is tribute to the passionate pursuit of open source by Red Hat that we have the good fortune of adding these these deeply experienced attorneys as part of our ranks" said Michael Cunningham, Red Hat's Executive Vice President and General Counsel. "With the combination of Richard and Rob, we've added important bandwidth to help promote, protect and defend the fundamental changes in innovation being liberated by broad communities of use, such as the free and open source software community."

 

Fontana will be based at Red Hat's Westford, Mass. office. Tiller will be based at Red Hat's headquarters in Raleigh, N.C.

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About Red Hat, Inc.

Red Hat, the world's leading open source solutions provider, is headquartered in Raleigh, NC with over 50 satellite offices spanning the globe. CIOs have ranked Red Hat first for value in Enterprise Software for four consecutive years in the CIO Insight Magazine Vendor Value study. Red Hat provides high-quality, affordable technology with its operating system platform, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, together with applications, management and Services Oriented Architecture (SOA) solutions, including the JBoss Enterprise Middleware Suite. Red Hat also offers support, training and consulting services to its customers worldwide. Learn more: http://www.redhat.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements contained in this press release may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements provide current expectations of future events based on certain assumptions and include any statement that does not directly relate to any historical or current fact. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including: risks related to the integration of acquisitions; the ability of the Company to effectively compete; the inability to adequately protect Company intellectual property and the potential for infringement or breach of license claims of or relating to third party intellectual property; risks related to data and information security vulnerabilities; ineffective management of, and control over, the Company's growth and international operations; adverse results in litigation; and changes in and a dependence on key personnel as well as other factors contained in our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K (copies of which may be accessed through the Securities and Exchange Commission's website at http://www.sec.gov), including those found therein under the captions Risk Factors and Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations. In addition, the forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company's views as of the date of this press release and these views could change. However, while the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company's views as of any date subsequent to the date of the press release.

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  • About Red Hat
  • Red Hat is the world’s leading provider of open source software solutions, using a community-powered approach to reliable and high-performing cloud, Linux, middleware, storage and virtualization technologies. Red Hat also offers award-winning support, training, and consulting services. As the connective hub in a global network of enterprises, partners, and open source communities, Red Hat helps create relevant, innovative technologies that liberate resources for growth and prepare customers for the future of IT. Learn more at http://www.redhat.com.



  • Forward-Looking Statements
  • Certain statements contained in this press release may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements provide current expectations of future events based on certain assumptions and include any statement that does not directly relate to any historical or current fact. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including: risks related to delays or reductions in information technology spending; the effects of industry consolidation; the ability of the Company to compete effectively; the integration of acquisitions and the ability to market successfully acquired technologies and products; uncertainty and adverse results in litigation and related settlements; the inability to adequately protect Company intellectual property and the potential for infringement or breach of license claims of or relating to third party intellectual property; the ability to deliver and stimulate demand for new products and technological innovations on a timely basis; risks related to data and information security vulnerabilities; ineffective management of, and control over, the Company’s growth and international operations; fluctuations in exchange rates; and changes in and a dependence on key personnel, as well as other factors contained in our most recent Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q (copies of which may be accessed through the Securities and Exchange Commission’s website at http://www.sec.gov), including those found therein under the captions "Risk Factors" and "Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations". In addition to these factors, actual future performance, outcomes, and results may differ materially because of more general factors including (without limitation) general industry and market conditions and growth rates, economic and political conditions, governmental and public policy changes and the impact of natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. The forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company’s views as of the date of this press release and these views could change. However, while the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company’s views as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release.