开源促传统财产软件公司开放
作者： 451
责任编辑： 阚智
来源： 《电脑商情报》
时间： 2007-02-15 05:55
The 451 Group has found that the overall trend of proprietary software vendors 'going open' ? i.e., adopting open source software approaches ? is increasing significantly, either as a major business-model shift away from software license fees as the basis for customer usage or in the more limited release of some code using an open source license. The majority of software vendors that have made a move to open source have only done so in the past year or two. The results of these early cases will influence the future direction of proprietary software vendors' selling practices and end users' buying preferences. This finding is discussed in a new report by The 451 Group, a New York-based technology-industry analyst company focused on the business of enterprise IT innovation. This is the third report from the 451 Commercial Adoption of Open Source (CAOS) Research Service, a first-of-its-kind service investigating both user experiences and vendor strategies as enterprise customers begin to deploy open source software.
"Open source is changing the relationships between software vendors and their customers. This is not only the case for the level of participation from a software vendor's customer base in the software development process, but also in the level of risk incurred by an end-user organization in doing business with a software vendor, especially a startup," said Raven Zachary, Senior Analyst and Practice Head for Open Source at The 451 Group. "Open source has become the new form of code escrow, allowing smaller software vendors and startups to compete more effectively for large enterprise customers by providing the code and a community for ensured long-term viability."
451 analysts found that the justification for a vendor going open varies, but in most cases it relates to competitive pressure in one form or another ? the desire to retain or grow market share, the perceived value of first-mover advantage, entering an existing and mature market or, in the case of a distressed business model, where open source provides a final alternative to generate demand.
"Although services are often considered the most likely path for software vendors looking to generate revenue from open source, almost half of the 31 vendors we interacted with for this report indicated that the greatest revenue opportunity was in commercial licensing," said Zachary.
"Open source is changing the relationships between software vendors and their customers. This is not only the case for the level of participation from a software vendor's customer base in the software development process, but also in the level of risk incurred by an end-user organization in doing business with a software vendor, especially a startup," said Raven Zachary, Senior Analyst and Practice Head for Open Source at The 451 Group. "Open source has become the new form of code escrow, allowing smaller software vendors and startups to compete more effectively for large enterprise customers by providing the code and a community for ensured long-term viability."
451 analysts found that the justification for a vendor going open varies, but in most cases it relates to competitive pressure in one form or another ? the desire to retain or grow market share, the perceived value of first-mover advantage, entering an existing and mature market or, in the case of a distressed business model, where open source provides a final alternative to generate demand.
"Although services are often considered the most likely path for software vendors looking to generate revenue from open source, almost half of the 31 vendors we interacted with for this report indicated that the greatest revenue opportunity was in commercial licensing," said Zachary.
