Open Source Meets Business 2008

Abstract

Open source business models look a lot like a return to the “golden years” of software startups
Those were marked by reduced sales and marketing costs, together with increased investment in
research and development.
Looking back to the times before the internet bubble burst, we see models we can use as reference.
Regarding the Open Source business it’s still early– there are few proof points; the models are still evolving.
As a prerequisite of success, sales and marketing costs have to be managed well. The product must lead. The benefit to sales and marketing comes from converting downloads to dollars.

Biographie: Larry Augustin

Larry Augustin is an angel investor and advisor to early stage technology companies. He currently serves on the Boards of Directors of Compiere, Fonality, Hyperic, Medsphere, Pentaho, SugarCRM, and XenSource. One of the group who coined the term "Open Source", he has written and spoken extensively on Open Source worldwide. Worth Magazine named him to their list of the Top 50 CEOs in 2000. From 2002 to 2004 he was a Venture Partner at Azure Capital Partners. In 1993 he founded VA Linux (now SourceForge, NASDAQ:LNUX) serving as CEO until August 2002. While CEO he launched SourceForge.net and led the company through an IPO in December 1999. Larry can be found online at http://lmaugustin.com.