I’m glad to report that we will have a new open source conference in Europe, focused on commercial open source. I’ll be a speaker and panelist and helped initiate the event. It is not the first of its kind, but I’m very happy that we have a new one with hopefully more staying power than previous attempts.
I will report about my research and teaching on commercial open source (and underlying business models, in particular how cloud computing has been changing the game), and I will focus on explaining how commercial open source startups in Germany can acquire public funding without giving up equity. Here is my introduction:
I’m a professor of software engineering, specializing in open source. Before I became a professor, I had worked in industry for many years, most of the time for software vendors: Startups and large companies alike, in Germany, Switzerland, and the U.S.A. (both Boston and Silicon Valley). I teach a course on commercial open source startups at University of California, Santa Cruz (over the hill from Silicon Valley) and FAU in Germany. My goal is to help my colleagues commercialize their research projects the open source way. There has never been a better time for commercial open source startups in Germany: You can create and grow your company well into Series A funding using public money without giving up any equity, and part of my value proposition to startup teams is to be the channel to these funds. I look forward to our discussion!
Please see the Open Source Business Forum website for more information.
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