EV1Servers continued its strong growth in March, bucking speculation that its licensing deal with The SCO Group would prompt a mass exodus of customers. The dedicated server company had a net gain of 32,054 hostnames for the period ended March 10, continuing robust growth that has seen EV1Servers add more than 460,000 hostnames in the past 12 months.

On March 1, EV1Servers becoming the first publicly identified company to have paid SCO to settle its disputed legal claims involving Linux. Our March data shows EV1Servers with a net gain of more than 28K hostnames on Linux, as calls for a boycott appear to have had little impact. About 37K hostnames moved from EV1Servers to other providers in the March tracking period - less than February's total of 44k and only slightly higher than the six-month average of 31k departures per month - while 32K hostnames migrated in from other providers.

That modest net loss was more than offset by the 52K hostnames gained through new signups, as EV1Servers' launch of a new data center ended an inventory logjam. Data from our Sites on the Move monitoring, which reports site switching based on sites queried by users of our "Whats that site running?" form, suggest that EV1Servers continues to experience a healthy inflow of customers.

That doesn't mean EV1Servers is entirely pleased with the way the SCO license has worked out. CEO Robert Marsh has had second thoughts about the deal, expressing surprise at the intense reaction in the Linux community and dismay at SCO's public discussion of the financial terms of the deal. "Would I do it again? No," Marsh told InfoWorld this week.