Open Source: A Silver Lining in the Economic Slump

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Sales at open-source software companies are booming, even as stock prices slump and corporate IT spending plummets, Are the good times here?


The economy may be a shambles, but open-source software is doing better than ever.It provides software at a lower price than enterpraise competitors. In fact, open-source supplies the basic software for free, making money by selling support services or additional features. Its annual fees can be as much as 85% to 90% lower than its competitors. Open-source seeing more interest from companies looking to replace an older software product they can no longer afford.
This "try-before-you-buy" phenomenon is common in the open-source world, and the vendors say they don't need to keep an army of sales people because customers can easily find their products.

Budget Squeeze boosts Asterisk

The demand for Open Source's wares reflects companies' increasingly urgent search for low-priced alternatives to products no longer supported by shrinking IT budgets. Corporate software purchasing in the current quarter is undergoing its sharpest decline ever. The economic slump is fueling a miniboom in open source open source. Four open-source vendors said in interviews that they've posted record third quarters, and most are optimistic that the current quarter will bring more gains. But downloads of a free software don't bring in much money unless customers also opt for support services or added features, such as security enhancements. At publicly traded open-source companies, rising sales don't necessarily result in a climbing share price.

Open-Ended Growth?

Despite near-term interest in open-source alternatives, many investors remain concerned about the long-term growth prospects of open-source software. There's still plenty of room for growth.




Source: parts from BW