Open source urged to remain European

Posted on July 5, 2006
Filed Under Open Source |

“I think Europe needs to reassert itself as the business center for Europe.” Okay, but where else would the business center for Europe be, somewhere not in Europe?

The entire premise underlying this article is a bunch of crap, I mean who really cares where a company is located. I think it’s a little disingenuous to suggest that European companies are relocating to the U.S. at the insistence of “greedy capitalist investors” when in fact the companies feature U.S. investors because that is primarily who is funding these deals. Spend some time in London, Munich, or Paris and try to find a early stage investor for a open source enterprise software deal and you will know what I am referring to.

With over half of the global IT economy located in North America, of course it’s natural for companies to setup HQ here, and combined with the tax issues around equity for founders and employees it makes fiscal sense as well. Matt is right that Europe has a unique opportunity to leverage open source technology development to regain prominence in the global IT economy, but to suggest that a company has to be based in Europe to realize that is anti-thetical to the “world is flat” promise that open source is founded upon.

Open source urged to remain European - Computer Business Review: “I think Europe needs to reassert itself as the business center for Europe,” he said, noting that enterprise open source software vendors are in a position to do so, but only if they stop moving to North America. “They need to stop moving to Silicon Valley,” he said. “There are no customers in Silicon Valley, only vendors.”

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