Open Source ECM: Alfresco Business Strategy
Alfresco meetup for community and customers took place here in Rome two weeks ago, featuring both John Newton and John Powell, respectively Alfresco CTO and CEO.
I asked few questions to John Powell, learning more about Alfresco licensing story, and about differences between Alfresco Enterprise Edition and Alfresco Labs.
Roberto, I never advocated a move to the Apache license. I simply raised a question. I’m surprised by the amount of misunderstanding that arises from it. Are people so stuck in their own way of thinking that they can’t allow others to ask questions and probe new ways of doing business?
You call our licensing history “hectic.” I call it progressive. We’ve consistently matched the right license for the right phase of the company’s development. I won’t pretend that we always knew exactly why we did X or Z, but then, who does?
You suggest our strategy makes it hard for us to work with governments, and yet government remains one of our top-three verticals. We’re making millions upon millions of dollars with government customers. I am bewildered by your suggestion there.
And as for Funambol, we have the same model (or very similar) as it does. The only difference is that Funambol has given up on trying to sell to enterprise customers, and this is our main type of customer. Other than that, there really is no difference.
So…I’m confused by your post a bit.