Ralph Yarro III

Last updated
Ralph Yarro
NationalityAmerican
EducationBA Political Science, Brigham Young University
Organization(s)Atua Ventures - Co-founder and Managing Director
Known forVenture Capitalism, Entrepreneurship, and Activism
Notable workThe Canopy Group, CP80, Atua Ventures
Board member ofTechcyte, The SCO Group, Altiris, Maxstream

Ralph J. Yarro is an American business executive, entrepreneur and an activist. He co-founded Atua Ventures and was previously the CEO of the Canopy Group. [1] Yarro has been associated with various technology companies, including Altiris, Caldera, Techcyte, Center 7, Lineo, Linux Networx, and Voonami.

Contents

In 2006, Yarro founded The CP80 Foundation, an organization focused on censoring internet pornography. [2]

Background

Yarro relocated to Utah in 1982 and pursued a BA in Political Science at Brigham Young University. [3] [4] He later undertook postgraduate studies at the University of Utah, focusing on Computer Aided Design, User Interface (UI), Graphics, and Fine Art. [5] He began his career in computer game design and subsequently joined Novell. [1] [3] Within Novell, he was an original member of the Corsair project team, which aimed to develop technology that would compete with Microsoft and keep Novell competitive. . [6]

Career

The Canopy Group & SCO Group

His tenure with Novell, allowed Yarro to collaborate with Ray Noorda across various Noorda family enterprises. [1] in 1995, He advanced to the position of president and CEO of The Canopy Group, Inc. [7] By 2000, under Yarro's leadership, The Canopy Group's portfolio expanded to include over 50 companies such as Altiris, Caldera Systems, Lineo, Helius, Center 7, Maxstream, KeyLabs, MTI, MyFamily.com, Lineo, Linux Networx, and Vintela among others. [6]

He also became the chairman of the board for the SCO Group, Inc., holding a significant share of SCO's common stock. [8]

Companies founded

In 2005, Yarro established ThinkAtomic, Inc., aimed at supporting emerging technology ventures. [4] He was the company's president and CEO until he partnered with Mike Wolfgramm to merge their companies, leading to the inception of Atua Ventures. Yarro presently serves as the managing director of Atua Ventures. [9] He is the founder of many tech companies, including Techcyte and Voonami. [10] [11] Techcyte integrates technology, especially Artificial Intelligence, in digital diagnostics, while Voonami provides data center services for startups in Utah. [12] [4]

Yarro, along with his brother Justin, also co-founded Ximbiot, Inc., an industrial design company that produced products like Zimbi, a fruit-flavored punch in distinctive rocket-shaped bottles. [13]

Board memberships

Yarro has invested in and secured roles ranging from, chairman, board member, to trustee in a variety of technology firms, both national and international, such as Altiris, Caldera, Lineo, Maxstream, MyFamily.com, Troll Tech, Copilot, Katoa Biotech, Xymbiot, Yarro studios, and others. [3] [14] [15] By 2006, he is known to have made investments in more than 120 companies. [15]

Canopy lawsuit (2004–2005)

From 2004–2005, Yarro faced a legal dispute after his termination from his role as director of the Canopy Group. He, alongside executives Darcy Mott and Brent Christensen, was dismissed by founders Ray and Lewena Noorda. [16] The trio subsequently sued Canopy for US$100 million, alleging wrongful termination instigated by Val Noorda Kreidel, Ra Noorda's daughter. [1] In response, the Canopy Group, managed by William Mustard, countersued Yarro for alleged misappropriation of $20 million. The case was settled on March 8, 2005. The terms included Yarro acquiring all Canopy Group shares in The SCO Group and receiving an undisclosed settlement amount. All three plaintiffs relinquished their roles and interests in Canopy. [16] [17]

Activism

Yarro's Law (S.B. 239)

In 2003, Yarro promoted the passage of a bill to align Utah's IP laws with those of California. Known as "The Unfair Competition Law", it was ratified in 2004 and was referenced in subsequent legal proceedings, notably SCO's lawsuit against IBM. [18] [19] [20]

CP80

Starting in 2006, Yarro exerted efforts to combatting internet pornography. He established the non-profit organization CP80, which offers resources and information to help protect children on the internet. [21] [22] Yarro advocated for legislation to segregate mature content, assigning a separate port distinct from the default HTTP port 80. [23] [7] [14] He asserts that this provides an equitable balance between online safety and free speech. [21] [14] Collaborating with legal scholars and other stakeholders, Yarro seeks nationwide support for this initiative. [21]

On March 13, 2007, Utah Governor Jon Huntsman Jr. endorsed House Concurrent Resolution 3, promoting stricter federal regulations on Internet pornography, with CP80 foundation playing a pivotal role in the legislation. [24] Yarro subsequently proposed that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) be responsible for content on open wireless access ports, ensuring children's safety online, imposing fines on violators and suggesting tax incentives for compliant ISPs. [25] This proposal faced opposition from some local ISPs. [25]

Political contributions

Yarro contributed political campaigns as an extension of his activism. [26] Notably, he has supported Senator Orrin Hatch and Chris Cannon of Utah. [14] In 2007, he contributed to Mitt Romney's presidential campaign and later to John McCain's campaign after Romney's withdrawal. In 2020, he supported John Curtis in his re-election campaign for Utah's 3rd Congressional District and also backed Burgess Owens for the 4th Congressional District of Utah. [27] [28]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DR-DOS</span> MS-DOS-like operating system

DR-DOS is a disk operating system for IBM PC compatibles. Upon its introduction in 1988, it was the first DOS that attempted to be compatible with IBM PC DOS and MS-DOS.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Novell</span> 1980–2014 American multinational software and services company

Novell, Inc. was an American software and services company headquartered in Provo, Utah, that existed from 1980 until 2014. Its most significant product was the multi-platform network operating system known as Novell NetWare.

Darl Charles McBride is an entrepreneur and CEO of Shout TV Inc. McBride is known as the former CEO of The SCO Group. On March 7, 2003, during McBride's tenure as CEO of the company, The SCO Group initiated litigation against IBM, alleging breach of contract and copyright infringement claims connected to Unix. SCO Group lost in a series of court battles, and was eventually forced into bankruptcy.

<i>SCO Group, Inc. v. International Business Machines Corp.</i>

SCO Group, Inc. v. International Business Machines Corp., commonly abbreviated as SCO v. IBM, is a civil lawsuit in the United States District Court of Utah. The SCO Group asserted that there are legal uncertainties regarding the use of the Linux operating system due to alleged violations of IBM's Unix licenses in the development of Linux code at IBM. The lawsuit was filed in 2003, it has lingered on through the bankruptcy of SCO Group and the adverse result in SCO v. Novell, and was reopened for continued litigation by order of a new judge on June 14, 2013. Pursuant to the court order reopening the case, an IBM Motion for Summary Judgment was filed based upon the results of the Novell decision. On December 15, 2014, the judge granted most of IBM's motion, thereby narrowing the scope of the case, which remained open. On March 1, 2016, following a ruling against the last remaining claims, the judge dismissed SCO's suit against IBM with prejudice. SCO filed an appeal later that month. In February 2018, as a result of the appeal and the case being partially remanded to the circuit court, the parties restated their remaining claims and provided a plan to move toward final judgement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SCO Group</span> Defunct American software company

The SCO Group was an American software company in existence from 2002 to 2012 that became known for owning Unix operating system assets that had belonged to the Santa Cruz Operation, including the UnixWare and OpenServer technologies, and then, under CEO Darl McBride, pursuing a series of high-profile legal battles known as the SCO-Linux controversies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Caldera International</span> Defunct American software company

Caldera International, Inc., earlier Caldera Systems, was an American software company that existed from 1998 to 2002 and developed and sold Linux- and Unix-based operating system products.

<i>Groklaw</i> Legal website

Groklaw is a website that covered legal news of interest to the free and open source software community. Started as a law blog on May 16, 2003, by paralegal Pamela Jones ("PJ"), it covered issues such as the SCO-Linux lawsuits, the EU antitrust case against Microsoft, and the standardization of Office Open XML.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">UnixWare</span> Unix operating system

UnixWare is a Unix operating system. It was originally released by Univel, a jointly owned venture of AT&T's Unix System Laboratories (USL) and Novell. It was then taken over by Novell. Via Santa Cruz Operation (SCO), it went on to Caldera Systems, Caldera International, and The SCO Group before it was sold to UnXis. UnixWare is typically deployed as a server rather than a desktop. Binary distributions of UnixWare are available for x86 architecture computers. UnixWare is primarily marketed as a server operating system.

Raymond John "Ray" Noorda was a U.S. computer businessman. He was CEO of Novell between 1982 and 1994. He also served as chairman of Novell until he was replaced in 1994.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canopy Group</span> American investment firm

The Canopy Group is an American investment and property management firm founded by Ray Noorda in 1995 through the Noorda Family Trust. It is headquartered in Lindon, Utah. At various times it has consisted of, or been known as, Canopy Technologies, Canopy Properties, and Canopy Ventures.

In a series of legal disputes between SCO Group and Linux vendors and users, SCO alleged that its license agreements with IBM meant that source code IBM wrote and donated to be incorporated into Linux was added in violation of SCO's contractual rights. Members of the Linux community disagreed with SCO's claims; IBM, Novell, and Red Hat filed claims against SCO.

<i>SCO Group, Inc. v. Novell, Inc.</i>

SCO v. Novell was a United States lawsuit in which the software company The SCO Group (SCO), claimed ownership of the source code for the Unix operating system. SCO sought to have the court declare that SCO owned the rights to the Unix code, including the copyrights, and that Novell had committed slander of title by asserting a rival claim to ownership of the Unix copyrights. Separately, SCO was attempting to collect license fees from Linux end-users for Unix code through their SCOsource division, and Novell's rival ownership claim was a direct challenge to this initiative. Novell had been increasing their investments in and support of Linux at this time, and was opposed to SCO's attempts to collect license fees from Novell's potential customers.

Beginning in 2003, The SCO Group was involved in a dispute with various Linux vendors and users. SCO initiated a series of lawsuits, the most known of which were SCO v. IBM and SCO v. Novell, that had implications upon the futures of both Linux and Unix. SCO claimed that Linux violated some of SCO's intellectual properties. Many industry observers were skeptical of SCO's claims, and they were strongly contested by SCO's opponents in the lawsuits, some of which launched counter-claims. By 2011, the lawsuits fully related to Linux had been lost by SCO or rendered moot and SCO had gone into bankruptcy. However the SCO v. IBM suit continued for another decade, as it included contractual disputes related to both companies' involvement in Project Monterey in addition Linux-related claims. Finally in 2021 a settlement was reached in which IBM paid the bankruptcy trustee representing what remained of SCO the sum of $14.25 million.

Lineo was a thin client and embedded systems company spun out of Caldera Thin Clients by 20 July 1999.

DeviceLogics was a company in Lindon, Utah, USA, founded in November 2002. Originally doing business mostly under the DeviceLogics name, the company was incorporated as DRDOS, Inc. for legal reasons. The DeviceLogics name was later dropped.

Caldera OpenLinux (COL) is a defunct Linux distribution. Caldera originally introduced it in 1997 based on the German LST Power Linux distribution, and then taken over and further developed by Caldera Systems since 1998. A successor to the Caldera Network Desktop put together by Caldera since 1995, OpenLinux was an early "business-oriented distribution" and foreshadowed the direction of developments that came to most other distributions and the Linux community generally.

The CP80 Foundation is an organization in the United States that advocates regulating the Internet to make it easier for users to filter out pornography. The foundation suggests using education, Internet governance, and legislation to achieve its goals.

The Internet Community Ports Act (ICPA), created and advocated by The CP80 Foundation, is an approach to HTTP content filtering, leveraging Transmission Control Protocol ports to segregate content between "Community Ports" and "Open Ports." "Community Ports" would be for content that is not considered "obscene or harmful" to children; "Open Ports" would be for all other content, including content only considered suitable for adults, such as pornography. According to the advocates of ICPA, this would enable an individual to, through their ISP's firewall, choose the content they want by port, allowing content or blocking out content individually. Advocates of ICPA would particularly like to remove "objectionable" content from Port 80, the standard port for World-Wide Web traffic.

Caldera, Inc. was a Canopy-funded software company founded in October 1994 and incorporated on 25 January 1995 by former Novell employees Bryan Wayne Sparks, Ransom H. Love and others to develop the Caldera Network Desktop (CND) and later create a Linux distribution named OpenLinux (COL). The company was originally based in Provo and later in Orem, Utah, USA.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DR-WebSpyder</span> A graphical web browser for DOS and Linux

DR-WebSpyder is a DOS web browser, mail client and operating system runtime environment that was developed by Caldera UK in 1997. It was based on the DR-DOS operating system and networking components from Novell as well as the Arachne web browser by Michal Polák of xChaos software. The system was designed to run on low-end desktop systems, but being able to boot and execute from disk as well as from ROM or network, it was also tailored for x86-based thin clients and embedded systems with or without disk drives. Using the web browser as its principal user interface, it could be also used for kiosk systems and set-top boxes. It was ported to Linux in 1999 under the name Embrowser and was renamed Embedix Browser in 2000.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Anders, George (2005-03-09). "A Fight Over $20 Million With the 'Grandfather From Hell'". Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660.
  2. ↑ Peterson, Janice (2008-02-20). "Orem company develops software to fight porn exposure". heraldextra.com.
  3. 1 2 3 Clark, Drew (2014-10-05). "Drew Clark: An entrepreneurial spirit, plus education, plants seeds for economic success". Deseret News.
  4. 1 2 3 Harvey, Tom (2012-06-09). "ThinkAtomic gives startups a head start". The Salt Lake Tribune.
  5. ↑ "Ralph Yarro - CEO/Chairman/Founder/Investor at Voonami". THE ORG.
  6. 1 2 "The Tech Crusader". Utah Business. Salt Lake City, Utah: Utah Business Publishers, LLC. 2004-10-01.
  7. 1 2 Hruska, Joel (2009-03-20). "Save the children? ICANN opens debate on CyberSafety charter". Ars Technica.
  8. ↑ "Schedule 13D - The SCO Group, Inc". www.sec.gov.
  9. ↑ "Atua Ventures". www.atuaventures.com.
  10. ↑ "About Us | Techcyte". techcyte.com.
  11. ↑ "Voonami Announces New Green Salt Lake Data Center". Voonami, Inc. 2010-02-09.
  12. ↑ "Zoetis & Techcyte Celebrate Two Millionth Test on the Vetscan Imagyst Platform". FOX 2. 2023-07-10.
  13. ↑ Harvey, Tom (2012-06-09). "New drink less about the juice, more about the bottle". The Salt Lake Tribune.
  14. 1 2 3 4 Page, Jared (2005-12-01). "Utahn tries new tack in battle over Net porn". Deseret News.
  15. 1 2 "A Selection of Utah Valley Enterprises Old and New that Keep themselves on the Cutting Edge". Daily Herald 100. Provo Utah. 2006-04-23.
  16. 1 2 Shankland, Stephen (2005-03-11). "Settlement leaves SCO board intact". CNET. Archived from the original on 2013-01-20.
  17. ↑ "Groklaw - Canopy-Yarro-Noorda Etc. Statement on Settlement". www.groklaw.net. 2005-03-12. Archived from the original on 2015-09-24.
  18. ↑ "S.B. 239 Enrolled UNFAIR BUSINESS PRACTICES". Utah State Legislature. 2004-06-02. Archived from the original on 2004-06-02.
  19. ↑ Mima, Bob (2005-02-18). "Nasdaq poised to delist SCO". The Salt Lake Tribune.
  20. ↑ Markoff, John (2003-10-13). "Copyright Lawsuit Is Turnabout for SCO". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331.
  21. 1 2 3 Vandagriff, G.G. (2007-02-16). "Ralph Yarro – Putting His All on the Altar to Save Families". LDS Magazine.
  22. ↑ Westenskow, Rosalie (2007-02-16). "Provo film calls porn epidemic". Deseret News.
  23. ↑ Osterloh, Shirley (2007-01-19). "Utah Legislators Considering 'Porno Ports' to Access Mature Content". www.ksl.com.
  24. ↑ Johnson, Nathan (2007-03-13). "Huntsman to sign anti-porn resolution". Daily Herald. Archived from the original on 2007-03-17.
  25. 1 2 Gralla, Preston (2007-04-19). "SCO honcho: It's time to ban free Wi-Fi". Computerworld.
  26. ↑ "NEWSMEAT ▷ YARRO's federal campaign contribution search results". Archived from the original on 2011-06-04. Retrieved 2007-02-28.
  27. ↑ "William Becker donates $250 to John Curtis' campaign committee from January to June". SLC Times. 2020-08-22.
  28. ↑ "Burgess Owens' campaign committee receives $50 from Harris Mcilwain". SLC Times. 2021-03-29.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.