According to Greg’s email, organizations that contributed more than 100
changesets to the recently released 2.6.23 kernel included: Red Hat
with 827 changesets (11.7%), IBM with 557 changesets (7.9%), the Linux
Foundation with 528 changesets (7.5%), Novell with 449 changesets
(6.3%), Intel with 242 changesets (3.4%), Oracle with 158 changesets
(2.2%), MIPS Technologies with 143 changesets (2%), Nokia with 133
changesets (1.9%), and NetApp with 119 changesets (1.7%). Greg noted
that there were a total of 7,075 changesets from 992 developers working
for 126 different employers. 843 of the changesets (11.9%) were
contributed by individuals reporting no sponsor for their work.From http://kerneltrap.org/Linux/Who_Sponsors_Kernel_Development
I think many companies coming into Linux don’t understand how smart IBM, RedHat, Oracle, and others have been in driving the project. After all this time, there are still many execs who think that some magical community of elves is just waiting for the right pitch to develop code in exchange for maybe some glass beads and pats on the head.