We’ve launched a series of Founder Dinners as a part of our ongoing commitment to champion a strong community of entrepreneurs building the future of AI, data infrastructure, app and web development. Open source is a big part of this. This week, we had the pleasure to host an inspiring group of open source founders, featuring the legendary Bob Young, Co-Founder of Red Hat. Partnering with OSS Capital, we dove into Bob’s fascinating journey of building Red Hat into the first billion-dollar open-source company. We left the evening armed with invaluable insights—from discussing the evolving strategies to commercialize and scale open-source businesses, to the importance of transparency in licensing, to even marital advice. Here’s a peek at some of our takeaways: 1️⃣ Open source software is much more than just a better development model; it's a superior marketing strategy. Unlike proprietary software, open source attracts users and potential customers at a fraction of the cost. 2️⃣ Running an OS startup can be compared to Geoffrey Rush’s Shakespeare in Love character, who said theatres face “insurmountable obstacles on the road to imminent disaster," and yet, things mysteriously work out in the end. 3️⃣ Open-source models operate like a barter system rather than pure altruism. Founders should focus on practical incentives benefiting developers, businesses, and communities. 4️⃣ Align your open source licenses (e.g., GPL, MIT) with providing transparency and consumer trust rather than strictly adhering to a particular model. 5️⃣ Help your customers ask for more value, not a lower price. It is important to sell the benefit your product delivers (e.g. developer happiness, trust, convenience, cost efficient, interoperability etc.), not the product. Special thanks to you to the incredible founders who joined us: Cube Dioxus Labs Draw Things Dylibso Flox HumanSignal InfinyOn Liquid AI MotherDuck Readyset Tobiko Upstash It’s the power of this community that will turn the ideas around the future of open source into reality.
Ron Efroni
3mo
Huge thanks for bringing us all together!
Tejas Kumar
3mo
Where are the women?
Oleg Isonen
3mo
It was so fun talking to Bob last time!
Harish Abbott
3mo
Bob Young great to see you inspiring a young generation of entrepreneurs. they are all lucky to have this time with you.
It was a fun evening spending time with a really smart and motivated group committed to making the world a better place place, one customer at a time. One clarification: It is important to sell the benefit of your product not the product. It is Nancy’s Needlepoint.com team who are selling happiness in the form of needlepoint canvases and kits. The astoundingly clever tech companies represented at dinner are delivering great benefits to their customers, just not necessarily happiness. 😎