100% Open Source Alfresco including Enterprise Features

[johnn]

Open source as a business model is still evolutionary and it is true for Alfresco too. Having had an opportunity to distribute and sell services to enterprise customers, we have come to the conclusion it is not necessary to withhold functionality to have enterprises invest in services and support. Therefore, we are considering making Alfresco, including Enterprise features, 100% open source in the 1.3 Release of Alfresco in May. There will still be an Enterprise service package that includes support, maintenance, additional documentation, indemnification and warranty.

We would like your help as we consider this initiative in positioning and in branding. If you could take a moment to take our poll, we would appreciate your input. Also, if you have any comments we would love to hear them.

-John Newton, CTO

[lgr]

Hi John,

I won't tell much about your question because i've already given my opinion on this topic.

Just two words :
- in my opinion, the larger the code is open and free, the better it is used, and you can develop a business over it.
- Go !

Thanks for having opened the question.

Laurent.

PS : i also vote for "Alfresco" alone.

[gdhirajpai]

I totally agree that most enterprise users would still take up a subscription to the maintenance services & the like.

Making the Enterprise functionality available through open source can definitely do no harm, in my honest opinion as it is sure to increase adoption and consequently, spawn a lot more of the paid subscriptions than current.

Think you guys are doing a great job…

[alarocca]

Just a word: great!

[alarocca]

Correct. Start by now!

BR, Alessandro

Why wait until 1.3 ?    Make 1.2 Enterprise available !!!

[rrahman]

I'm a IT Project manager for a federal agency considering deploying Alfresco as an alternate to other enterprise software.   I feel that there are significant savings in TCO for open source.  From what I've seen on the web, Alfresco would be a great product.

If the community edition were to parallel the features of the enterprise edition, it would allow us to run it through a live scenario of our business process.  This is extremely important for us.  If Alfresco moves in this direction, we would still purchase an Enterprise license.  Why?  Lot of federal agencies do not have the staff or time to support these products.  Even if I could support the product myself, I would not have time.  I would want something that was certified/reliable, and supported.

I often share my opinions about enterprise products with a variety of federal agencies, and if I am able to test Alfresco fully I will be sure to share my experience with everyone.

[michaelh]

If Alfresco moves in this direction, we would still purchase an Enterprise license.

This is exactly the same thing for us. Even if Alfresco is fully featured in the Opensourced version, we will continue to promote the enterprise support to provide our customers the level of service we can't provide ourselves as efficiently as the Alfresco Team.

[davidv]

I personally believe you are making the right decision. Customers are definately more willing to pay for support and services than just for features in any product. There are lot's of examples in the market that prove that already. (RedHat, JBoss, … ). It's also (partially) the reason why companies like SUN, Oracle, IBM etc … are making some of their products 'free'.

From a marketing/branding perspective, I would try to keep the branding as simple and straightforward as possible. There's nothing worse than a product range with too many product names and 'feature comparison matrices'. You need to get your name out, make sure that people associate it with what you're trying to accomplish (be a player in the ECM market?) and then, with some help from the community you've already started to build, the rest will hopefully follow. The name is already out there : 'Alfresco' so I'd stick to that. The support contracts could be under the umbrella of 'Enterprise Services' or something the like.

Our company has been active in content management a long time and I think Alfresco provides the market with a very promising product. I am very impressed by the quality and the speed at which you manage to bring out new versions. You've got some bright people and from what I can tell you're bringing in even more of those.

Keep up the good work ! I for one will be monitoring you closely 🙂



David Van Puyvelde

[toni]

This is amazing news.  I am so glad that Alfresco has become a truely open community.
I work for a K-12 education district, supporting Adaptive Technology for students with disabilities and special needs and we currently have a tremendous challenge in delivering and sharing resources not only to these special need students but to all students, teachers, and staffs.

I have inverstigated many open source products and found Alfresco not only will it eliminates our challenges but also will make an impact in the life of these students  and the teachers and staffs who use your technology to support them. I was able to show a few staff a demo of Alfresco with samples  Adaptive contents like Intellitools, BoardMaker, Video, Audio etc… and with no training they were about to find the content on the web and use it in their native Adaptive applications.  In the meeting, when we discuss about planning and implement Alfresco  for September 2006 school year they all clapped their hands (first time in the 2 years I've work here).

I would like to thank the wonderfully community here (especially Kevin & Gavin for answering some my naive questions eventhough I took me awhile to get it).  I could not have customized Alfresco  without your help.  And thank you John for making the Enterprise features standard on the open source.

I will difinitely promote the purchasing of support for the enterprise features because we can't do it alone, and we definitely promote your product here at our district of 50+ schools.and also to other surrounding school districts.

My apology for the long post. But just one last thing. I am doing a demo of Alfresco to the CIO and the webmaster and othe IT staff member in about two weeks in hope that they will like the product and approve it.  The news about the enterprise feature will greatly helps me in my presentation, and if you have any materials that you can point me too that would be great.

Gratefully,

Toni

[tomislav]

Therefore, we are considering making Alfresco, including Enterprise features, 100% open source in the 1.3 Release of Alfresco in May. There will still be an Enterprise service package that includes support, maintenance, additional documentation, indemnification and warranty.

To be in line with everyone, I also think this was very good business decision. At least here in my company full featured Alfresco will have greater chance to be introduced, and you get payed - which is reason for this decision.

Full featured free version could be our first step, and while it's services become crucial for our processes - us paying for peace of mind will be the way to go..

cheers,
Tomislav

[fselendic]

Great, great news. I was rather disappointed  when I saw your decision to make money by excluding some of functionality from free version, because I had a gut feeling that you guys have such a great product that could generate even greater income just from selling support.

This is wonderfull news. We were evaluating Alfresco in several scenarios, in all of which we would eventually need some of features from non-free versions, and those were priced a little to high for our part of the world and current conditions on our targeted market.

Thanks again.