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What is an Open Source Company Really Worth?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the sleeping-with-dollar-signs-in-your-eyes dept.

CNet has an interesting profile of MySQL, JBoss, and Zimbra, exploring what an open source company is actually worth. "Given how slowly revenue accumulates in an open-source company--assuming it is recognizing subscriptions over 12 months--bookings is probably the valuation metric being used or at least strongly considered. It surely is the metric by which the start-up wishes to be measured. So while Savio suggests we open-source entrepreneurs may be "sleeping with dollar signs in (our) eyes," there's clearly a lot of work to do before most open-source companies are worth selling. It's not worth selling out for $100 million. Not for the venture-backed companies, anyway."

2 of 82 comments (clear)

  1. OSS does not eliminate old rules. by jedidiah · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How do you value ANY company?

    They own stuff (buildings), they have staff and they have current revenue.

    It really shouldn't be that hard.

    I wouldn't evaluate the worth of Oracle based on what I thought the
    value of the Oracle RDBMS sourcecode was worth. I would look at what
    they are selling to people.

    With enterprise software, frontend licensing is just the tip of the iceberg.

    MySql corp really isn't that much different than Sun, IBM or Oracle in this respect.

    --
    A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
  2. Re:GPLv3's Poison Pill and Open Source buyouts... by Alphager · · Score: 4, Insightful

    That is no side-effekt.
    The copyright-owner can _ALWAYS_ choose whichever damn license catches his fancy, including some evil, sign-to-sell-your-soul-style EULA.
    It is working as intended.