Michael Skok, general partner at North Bridge Venture Partners, reports that competitive and economic factors are clearly driving opportunities across all levels. Ninety-five percent of respondents say a turbulent economy is good for open source software.
As in earlier studies, respondents indicated that lower total cost of ownership and freedom from vendor lock-in are key drivers. This year the rapid pace of innovation is highlighted as a top reason open source is attractive to businesses.
Sectors most susceptible to disruption by open source software in the next five years will be Web content management, content management systems and social software – moving ahead of traditional areas such as operating systems and databases.
Results were collected from over 550 respondents including software engineers/developers, CEOs/founders and IT management/staff primarily at small and midsized businesses. For full survey results visit the survey online.
Julie Langenkamp is editor-in-chief of Information Management. She can be reached at julie.langenkamp@sourcemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at @JulieLangenkamp.
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