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There seems to be a huge business opportunity in Europe right now, to sell support and customization of open source software to government players. Has anyone h

There seems to be a huge business opportunity in Europe right now, to sell support and customization of open source software to government players. Has anyone heard about a European company that’s been successful in this area?

pstuart 8mo ago
Yeah, this is a win/win opportunity and could drive more sponsorship of those projects as there'd be more interests invested in seeing them thrive.
pkulak 8mo ago
Matrix has done a bunch of work with the French government in the past. Hopefully they can capitalize on this sentiment.
- Flere-Imsaho 8mo ago
  More information here: https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633894/European-governments-opt-for-open-source-alternatives-to-Big-Tech-encrypted-communications https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633894/European-gover... (0ct 2025) Interestingly, there is also a NATO-Matrix app: https://element.io/en/case-studies/nato https://element.io/en/case-studies/nato
  - deleted 8mo ago
    [deleted]
dataviz1000 8mo ago
> to sell support and customization of open source software to government players Time to start a Drupal consulting firm again.
wickedwiesel 8mo ago
Sure. Nextcloud GmbH seems to be one of the winners. It sells a customized version aimed at government agencies. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nextcloud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nextcloud
- BrandoElFollito 8mo ago
  If what they sell is the open source Nextcloud, it is a horrendous product. Its architecture is weird, with a proxy inside you can harden only by editing data inside a container that is volatyile by design (and has to be). There are numerous issues opened on that topic, Nextcloud response is "live with it".
  - bean469 8mo ago
    We use it at work and everybody I asked loves it. I also recently moved my personal data to Nextcloud from Google Drive and it's been extremely pleasant to use
Zigurd 8mo ago
I had an occasion to speak to some of the wire.com people a couple years ago. They seemed to be really dedicated to security and privacy.
- internet_points 8mo ago
  Can you do audio calls with their free plan? They say no "audio conferencing", but I see a call button. And if I get the SMB plan, can I invite externals to a video conference or do I then have to pay for plans for them as well?
nonethewiser 8mo ago
Just goes to show how many structural problems there are to starting tech companies in Europe.
- yardie 8mo ago
  Yes, the problem is capital. US has loads of it and Europe does not. So a lot of European startups have 3 options: remain niche, get bought out buy US investors, move the corporate seat/brain trust to the US. There are many small European startups who do not have infrastructure to take on large European multinationals as clients. A lot of EU labor laws have hard requirements at 50 and 100 employees so startups stay below those lines and remain tech lifestyle companies.
  - ericmay 8mo ago
    Well the other large advantage is that the US is one single market with one common language (English) and while there are variations by state, pretty much one set of rules. So by starting a company in the United States you of course have access to incredibly deep capital markets, but you also have access to 350 million people mostly operating under one set of rules with one common language and largely one common culture. It's the same market advantage that China has, by and large.
    - ifwinterco 8mo ago
      It's one of the big ironies of the EU - every time it gets larger (good! increases market size) it also gets more fragmented in terms of languages, retained local rules etc. (bad, obviously). Now up to 24 official languages and still potentially growing in the future (although this is a bit of an overcount because some of them are mutually intelligible to various degrees, it's still a lot). It's interesting to think that at the time of original ECSC treaty there were only four languages (French, German, Dutch and Italian). That's just about manageable, now it is a bit of an issue
      - epolanski 8mo ago
dbl000 8mo ago
That seems to be the intention of https://mosa.cloud/ https://mosa.cloud/
- internet_points 8mo ago
  > Pricing starts at €199/month based on resource usage. We'll discuss your specific needs during onboarding. Out of the question for very small teams; very hard to evaluate with no free/cheap option.
PassingClouds 8mo ago
It could be similar to when China kicked out a lot of non-domestic players. They even had a nickname for it. From the link below. Fengkou fēng kǒu 风口 n. wind tunnel; an area or sector where, for a period of time, all investors want to invest in. Everyone stands a chance to fly when there is favorable wind blowing from behind. https://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn-chinese-blog/chinese-slang-buzzword-%E9%A3%8E%E5%8F%A3-feng-kou-area-huge-profit-potential/ https://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn-chinese-blog/chines...
mrits 8mo ago
If so it will be acquired by a US company
mickael-kerjean 8mo ago
As a Frenchman involved in creating an open source Dropbox (https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash) that can connect to any kind of storage and can expose itself as not only a web client but also SFTP, webdav and S3, with virtual filesystem capabilities and tons of other cool stuff, out of 60 customers, only 2 are French, the only people I see coming from France are only ever interested in open source because they don't want to pay anything (other countries in Europe are different though) If anyone involved in this transition read this, please contact us, we already got open source technology to replace box / Dropbox / OneDrive and Gdrive

pstuart 8mo ago

Yeah, this is a win/win opportunity and could drive more sponsorship of those projects as there'd be more interests invested in seeing them thrive.

pkulak 8mo ago

Matrix has done a bunch of work with the French government in the past. Hopefully they can capitalize on this sentiment.

Flere-Imsaho 8mo ago
More information here: https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633894/European-governments-opt-for-open-source-alternatives-to-Big-Tech-encrypted-communications https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633894/European-gover... (0ct 2025) Interestingly, there is also a NATO-Matrix app: https://element.io/en/case-studies/nato https://element.io/en/case-studies/nato
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]

dataviz1000 8mo ago

> to sell support and customization of open source software to government players Time to start a Drupal consulting firm again.

wickedwiesel 8mo ago

Sure. Nextcloud GmbH seems to be one of the winners. It sells a customized version aimed at government agencies. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nextcloud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nextcloud

BrandoElFollito 8mo ago
If what they sell is the open source Nextcloud, it is a horrendous product. Its architecture is weird, with a proxy inside you can harden only by editing data inside a container that is volatyile by design (and has to be). There are numerous issues opened on that topic, Nextcloud response is "live with it".
- bean469 8mo ago
  We use it at work and everybody I asked loves it. I also recently moved my personal data to Nextcloud from Google Drive and it's been extremely pleasant to use

Zigurd 8mo ago

I had an occasion to speak to some of the wire.com people a couple years ago. They seemed to be really dedicated to security and privacy.

internet_points 8mo ago
Can you do audio calls with their free plan? They say no "audio conferencing", but I see a call button. And if I get the SMB plan, can I invite externals to a video conference or do I then have to pay for plans for them as well?

nonethewiser 8mo ago

Just goes to show how many structural problems there are to starting tech companies in Europe.

yardie 8mo ago
Yes, the problem is capital. US has loads of it and Europe does not. So a lot of European startups have 3 options: remain niche, get bought out buy US investors, move the corporate seat/brain trust to the US. There are many small European startups who do not have infrastructure to take on large European multinationals as clients. A lot of EU labor laws have hard requirements at 50 and 100 employees so startups stay below those lines and remain tech lifestyle companies.
- ericmay 8mo ago
  Well the other large advantage is that the US is one single market with one common language (English) and while there are variations by state, pretty much one set of rules. So by starting a company in the United States you of course have access to incredibly deep capital markets, but you also have access to 350 million people mostly operating under one set of rules with one common language and largely one common culture. It's the same market advantage that China has, by and large.
  - ifwinterco 8mo ago
    It's one of the big ironies of the EU - every time it gets larger (good! increases market size) it also gets more fragmented in terms of languages, retained local rules etc. (bad, obviously). Now up to 24 official languages and still potentially growing in the future (although this is a bit of an overcount because some of them are mutually intelligible to various degrees, it's still a lot). It's interesting to think that at the time of original ECSC treaty there were only four languages (French, German, Dutch and Italian). That's just about manageable, now it is a bit of an issue
    - epolanski 8mo ago

dbl000 8mo ago

That seems to be the intention of https://mosa.cloud/ https://mosa.cloud/

internet_points 8mo ago
> Pricing starts at €199/month based on resource usage. We'll discuss your specific needs during onboarding. Out of the question for very small teams; very hard to evaluate with no free/cheap option.

PassingClouds 8mo ago

It could be similar to when China kicked out a lot of non-domestic players. They even had a nickname for it. From the link below. Fengkou fēng kǒu 风口 n. wind tunnel; an area or sector where, for a period of time, all investors want to invest in. Everyone stands a chance to fly when there is favorable wind blowing from behind. https://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn-chinese-blog/chinese-slang-buzzword-%E9%A3%8E%E5%8F%A3-feng-kou-area-huge-profit-potential/ https://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn-chinese-blog/chines...

mrits 8mo ago

If so it will be acquired by a US company

mickael-kerjean 8mo ago

As a Frenchman involved in creating an open source Dropbox (https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash) that can connect to any kind of storage and can expose itself as not only a web client but also SFTP, webdav and S3, with virtual filesystem capabilities and tons of other cool stuff, out of 60 customers, only 2 are French, the only people I see coming from France are only ever interested in open source because they don't want to pay anything (other countries in Europe are different though) If anyone involved in this transition read this, please contact us, we already got open source technology to replace box / Dropbox / OneDrive and Gdrive