"I think it's just going to be a safer and better world if we can get that done," McNealy said.

One audience member questioned whether Sun, whose fortunes have lessened since the dot-com bust early in the decade, could become a footnote in the computer industry like Silicon Graphics. But McNealy defended Sun's vitality, saying the company has US$4.5 billion in the bank and has had 17 consecutive years of positive cash flow. The company is a major player in microprocessors with Sparc and operating systems with Solaris, he added.

Customers still will need servers and Sun is developing grid technology, he said. Sun also has its Java software to increase opportunities, McNealy said. He also touted Sun's record of innovation. "We have a patent portfolio that's off the charts," McNealy said.

McNealy is the only co-founder who has been with the company uninterrupted since 1982. Khosla left in 1985 to become a venture capitalist while Joy left in 2003, also for the venture capital industry. Bechtolsheim departed Sun in 1995 but rejoined the company in 2004, when Sun acquired Kealia, which also was founded by Bechtolsheim. He serves as Sun's chief architect and senior vice president in the company's Network Systems Group.

The nearly two-and-half-hour session, which attracted about 300 persons, featured various musings from the four founders and John Gage, who served as moderator for the event and is chief researcher and director of the Science Office at Sun. The founders noted Sun's humble beginnings as a startup seeking venture capital so it could sell Bechtolsheim's economical workstations running Joy's Berkeley Unix software. This was an unconventional combination at the time.