Supposedly, IronPython runs as fast as the C-based implementation of Python-2.4, if not faster. The company claims that IronPython can run 1.8x faster than Python-2.4 right now.

Microsoft is moving two of its development languages -- IronPython and IronRuby -- as well as the company's Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR) to an Apache open-source license, company officials ...