Dr. Frederick H. Berenstein, Xandros Co-founder & Chairman

"I have the sad duty to announce that Dr. Frederick H. Berenstein, our co-founder and Chairman, died on September 6, 2005, after a courageous battle over many years," Xandros CEO, Andreas Typaldos, announced today. "Beyond Rick’s vision, inspiration, and leadership, which our industry, our company, and all of us will miss, I will personally miss his example of quiet courage, and his indomitable will, and determination. It is that courage and will, which enabled him to fight his illness, that also inspired Rick to push Linux forward, ahead of most other people, through visionary investments in companies such Ximian, CodeWeavers, and finally Xandros. His belief in the inevitability of Linux, from the days when I first met Rick in 1999 as one of his founding group of investors in Linux Global Partners, the Linux incubator that he had co-founded with his friend Wm. Jay Roseman, was infectious and hard to argue with," Typaldos continued. "There simply will not be another like him."

Dr. Berenstein was a familiar figure in the Linux community as the culmination of a proud career in both computing as well as science, beginning with his involvement with computers in 1965, when he started programming in Fortran on an IBM 1620 mainframe computer. From 1978 to 1982, Dr. Berenstein was responsible for the international banking operations of the Israeli-based Independence Mortgage and Development Bank. In 1985 he designed and programmed the airline reservation system for California’s TWA Express Carrier. Subsequently, from 1988 to 1990, Dr. Berenstein was CEO of Progressive Solutions, a software firm specializing in DOS task-switching technology, which was sold to Symantec Corporation in 1990. Dr. Berenstein was also an investor and director of Personics Corporation, the first-to-market company with a mainframe-to-PC data program, and was instrumental in that company’s merger with DataWatch Corporation, a NASDAQ-traded company, in 1992.

In his youth Rick studied under master pianist Anatole Kitain while living in Mexico City, where he performed several solo performances to critical acclaim. Arthur Rubinstein heard Rick at age 17 and invited him on concert tour of the US, but his mother told him "That’s no way to earn a living" so he didn’t go. Rick is noted in David Dubail’s new book "The Art of the Piano: Its Performers, Literature and Recordings."

Dr. Berenstein was a practicing psychoanalyst from 1971 to 2000. He was also an accomplished writer. His book "Lost Boys" was widely acclaimed for its insight into male adolescent behavior and his publication was often referred to by peers when analyzing troubled youth. Dr. Berenstein also wrote the "Family" column for the Ladies Home Journal for fifteen years and was a consultant for the movie "Analyze This" with Billy Crystal and Robert De Niro.

Dr. Berenstein lived in New York City and is survived by his wife, Robin, and by his three daughters and three grand-daughters.