I believe it's the other way around: V-Ray explicitly advertises that you can avoid those expensive Windows licenses for your render farm by using Linux. And Ho

I believe it's the other way around: V-Ray explicitly advertises that you can avoid those expensive Windows licenses for your render farm by using Linux. And Houdini and its Mantra renderer run natively on Linux since forever. As does Renderman, the Pixar in-house engine. If Pixar was forced to use Windows on their render farm, they'd be looking at a roughly $24mio !!! licensing bill. That's a VERY strong incentive to use Linux as much as possible.