The number of western companies cutting ties to the Russian government and closing operations in the country is growing on a daily basis. This includes two top Linux and open-source powers: Red Hat and SUSE.
Russian companies and the government itself have long depended on technology from the West as the foundation for their owned-and-operated IT systems. Servers from IBM, Dell Technologies, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co rule the Russian market.
SUSE CEO Melissa Di Donato, who announced the company’s pullout from Russia, decided that SUSE would support humanitarian efforts to help war victims such as refugees. This is a particularly complicated time for SUSE as many SUSE workers come from Ukrainian families.
Currently, SUSE is “evaluating all of our business relationships in Russia and has suspended all direct sales in Russia. The company is also “observing all economic sanctions” and ready to comply with any additional sanctions.”
Meanwhile, in the U.S., Paul Cormier, president and CEO of Red Hat, said, “Effective immediately, Red Hat is discontinuing sales and services in Russia and Belarus (for both organizations located in or headquartered in Russia or Belarus). This includes discontinuing partner relationships with organizations based in or headquartered in Russia or Belarus.”
Docker has likewise exited from Russia. Docker CEO Scott Johnson said, “Docker stands with the members in our Ukrainian community and the sovereign nation of Ukraine. … We will not do business with Russian companies during this period. As such, we have removed the ability to purchase Docker subscriptions from Russia and Belarus.”
Moreover, Microsoft President Brad Smith said the tech giant would aid Ukraine against Russian cyber attacks.
Many other US, United Kingdom, and EU companies have severed ties with Russia as well. These include Apple, Oracle, Netflix, TikTok, MasterCard, Visa, and DXC.
Furthermore, Salesforce also announced that it had started severing its customer relationships in Russia, which it said is just a small, non-material number.
For its part, Amazon Web Services said that its biggest customers in Russia are companies based outside the country, and that it has strictly complied with the company policy of not doing business with the Russian government.
Finally, IBM and Oracle have also ceased all business operations in Russia, and IBM stressed that the company strictly refuses to do business with Russian military organizations. HPE, Dell, SAP and Microsoft have all announced the stoppage of sales operations in the country.