The Software Freedom Conservancy alleges that VMware is using GPL-licensed code in its proprietary products
According to the SFC (Software Freedom Conservancy), a nonprofit organization hosting a variety of open source projects, VMware is facing a legal battle.
The SFC claims VMware is using the Linux kernel without respecting the terms of its copyright license, the GPL. As such, the group is standing behind developer Christoph Hellwig and is providing a grant to fund his action as he takes the virtualization giant to court in Hamburg, Germany.
Hellwig is a part of the Conservancy’s GPL Compliance Project for Linux Developers. Since joining it in 2012, he has spent a great deal of time investigating VMware’s use of both the Busybox command shell and the Linux kernel in its products.