In the fourth quarter, Novell reported $13 million in revenue from Linux platform products, which includes SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES). That figure was up 32 percent year over year. But revenue from Open Enterprise Server (OES) and NetWare fell 25 percent from the previous year.

Open Enterprise Server is a server operating system that provides a Netware-like interface for existing NetWare customers while running either a NetWare or SUSE Linux kernel. OES is meant to be a bridge product to help NetWare users transition fully to SLES.

The company said in a conference call that combined OES and NetWare revenues should continue to fall 15 percent to 20 percent year over year in fiscal 2007.

Novell predicts 2007 net revenue of between $945 million and $975 million. On a non-GAAP basis, adjusted income from operations is expected to be between break-even and $10 million.

That includes about $13 million Novell expects to receive in fiscal 2007 from the five-year, $68 million patent agreement with Microsoft for Novell's intellectual property, as well as between $4 million to $7 million in subscription revenue Novell hopes to earn from Microsoft customers who sign up for SUSE Linux subscriptions.