Trying All the Open Source Business Models with Brian Fox

This week on The Business of Open Source, I spoke with Brian Fox, co-founder and CTO of Sonatype. In addition to having a really interesting discussion about the usual topic of how to build a business around open source software, we also had a good conversation about security — it was hard to avoid, because we recorded this right after the xz backdoor discovery, and software supply chain security is kind of Brian’s thing.

Business-wise, though, we also covered some really cool topics. Including:

• The tension between an open source project that’s “too good” and yet the need for the sales team to close deals
• In some ways, the fully commercial, closed-source products in Sonatype’s product line are more straightforward… but there are challenges that go along with a pure closed-source approach, too, especially for a DevTool company.
• Choosing your relationship with open source depending on who your target user / target buyer is
• Pivoting to a top-down sales motion because the bottoms-up motion just didn’t work; and how that means the features that sell aren’t always the features that get used
• What Sonatype gets out of it’s relationship with Apache Maven and open source Nexus
• How do we solve real problems, and how do we solve them for real? Keeping in mind that no one buys what they need; they only buy what they want.

Check out the full episode, and come to Open Source Founders Summit if you want more opportunities to talk about about business and open source.