You’ve Provided Feedback. Red Hat Has Been Listening

When Red Hat began in 1995, it was embraced by the higher education community because it legitimized LINUX as an operating system that not only supported educators and researchers but provided a lower TCO for data centers running production environments. Red Hat’s outsider, subversive, and revolutionary reputation appealed to research, education, and IT leaders precisely for the contrast it provided to alternatives at that time. But along the 25-year journey, Red Hat evolved as a company that focused on other markets, and the special relationship Red Hat had with higher education morphed into more of a transactional one. Nancy Bohannan, VP SLED, was hired in 2020 to refocus the company on higher education. As part of her strategy, she brought in consulting firm Kovexa, and Kovexa hired Emeritus CIO-Wisconsin and former EDUCAUSE Board Chair Bruce Maas to solicit feedback from higher education IT leaders to prepare Red Hat for a major pivot. In this session, Maas interviews Bohannan about her goals and aspirations with regard to higher education. Bohannan will announce changes in how Red Hat will be working with the higher education community as a partner to advance the mission of higher education and to provide Red Hat with access to some of the best minds in the world in order to continue to grow and strengthen the relationship.