Alfresco Puts Increased Pressure on Proprietary Content Management Vendors
LONDON, Feb. 23 /PRNewswire/ -- Alfresco Software, Inc., the first and
leading provider of an open source enterprise content management solution,
today announced that it will offer its next release under the GNU Public
License (GPL), the world's most popular software license.
While the GPL has been widely adopted by Linux distributors and open
source infrastructure companies, Alfresco is leading what is expected to be
an increasing number of open source application companies to adopt the GPL.
Alfresco previously licensed its software under the Mozilla Public License
with a clause requiring attribution. The move, which further grows and
strengthens Alfresco's developer and OEM community, puts the company on a
collision course with proprietary content management vendors and sets off
what is expected to be a trend for open source application developers.
Alfresco has built one of the strongest open source brands in the
industry, establishing a role as the open source alternative to proprietary
enterprise content management software. The company has extended its ECM
strengths to web content management.
Adopting the GPL allows Alfresco to provide customers with
community-supported software while proprietary companies continue to charge
millions of dollars for similar but far less flexible and supportable
applications. Alfresco has developed a content repository system designed
to improve the collaboration, control and compliance of business documents,
web content and associated business processes.
"Moving Alfresco under the GPL makes a tough battle even tougher for
those companies still shackled by proprietary licenses designed to control
customers instead of empower them," said John Powell, CEO, Alfresco
Software Inc. "Alfresco is by far the leading brand when people think of
open source ECM and the move to GPL will accelerate that adoption across
the development, OEM and customer communities".
Alfresco provides its software under a number of flexible licenses,
designed to meet the particular requirements of different types of
customers:
-- For Open Source Projects: If customers are developing and
distributing open source software under the GPL they are free to use
Alfresco under the GPL License. If they are developing and
distributing open source software under an OSI-Approved License, but
not the GPL, and want to link Alfresco's GPL software with theirs,
Alfresco provides the GPL License with a FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open-Source
Software) Exception.
-- For Commercial OEMs, ISVs and VARs: For OEMs, ISVs, and VARs who
distribute Alfresco with their proprietary products, and do not wish
to license and distribute their source code under the GPL, Alfresco
provides a flexible OEM Commercial License.
-- For Enterprises, Government Organizations, Small- to Medium-sized
Businesses: Alfresco licenses Alfresco Enterprise under a Commercial
License to paid subscribers, similar to how MySQL, Red Hat, and other
leading open source companies license their technology. Those wishing
to use Alfresco for free under the GPL are able to download Alfresco
Community.
The re-licensing will not affect community users' rights in code they
have accepted under the modified MPL prior to February 2007. However, if
community customers download an update from Alfresco after the February
2007 release of Alfresco Community 2.0, the update will be covered by the
GPL plus FLOSS exception. The Alfresco FLOSS Exception enables software
provided under existing OSI-approved open source licenses to incorporate
the Alfresco Community software without having to license the entire
software package under the terms of the GPL. The license change does not
affect Alfresco Enterprise customers or use of any software customers
received from Alfresco prior to February release of Alfresco 2.0.
Alfresco has been downloaded over 500,000 times and already has a
number of major clients for its ECM system, including H&R Block, UK
Ministry of Defense, Primus a division of McGraw Hill, Boise Cascade and
four of the top ten global investment banks.
Further information can be found at:
http://www.alfresco.com/legal/licensing/faq
About Alfresco Software, Inc.
Alfresco Software, Inc. is the leading open source alternative for
enterprise content management. It is the first company to bring the power
of open source to the enterprise content management market, enabling
unprecedented scale and a much lower total cost of ownership than
proprietary systems. Founded by a team of content management veterans that
includes the co-founder of Documentum, John Newton, and former COO of
Business Objects, John Powell, Alfresco is based in London. For more
information, visit http://www.alfresco.com.
Media Contacts:
Ian Howells Mike Maney
Alfresco Software, Inc. PageOne Public Relations
+44 7775 865590 mike@pageonepr.com
press@alfresco.org mikemaney (aol im)
+1 215 345 7096 (office)
SOURCE Alfresco Software, Inc.
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Related links:
http://www.alfresco.com/
CONTACT:
Ian Howells of Alfresco Software, Inc., +44
7775 865590, press@alfresco.org; or Mike Maney of PageOne Public
Relations, +1-215-345-7096, mike@pageonepr.com, for Alfresco
Software, Inc.
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