Welcome to the OpenUK stand!

The UK’s organisation for the business of Open Technology, being open source software, open hardware and open data. OpenUK is led by CEO Amanda Brock with a pro bono Board, Leadership team, Ambassadors and various work groups and committees.

OpenUK @ FOSDEM

OpenUK is the UK organisation for the business of Open Technology delivering our activities through 3 pillars:

  • Community
  • Legal and Policy, and
  • Learning

Our vision is UK leadership and international collaboration in Open Technology and our 2022 focus will be on:

  • Skills
  • Security, and
  • Sustainability

As a UK not for profit industry organisation and advocacy body funded by partner donation and sponsorship. Join us as an Ambassador, support us, or participate in our activities for free. All are welcome.

OpenUK in 2022

A reminder of OpenUK's activities in 2021

With a focus on Skills, Security, and Sustainability, we started 2022 by celebrating the New Year’s Honours List and launching the ten Future Founders Training Sessions set up by Matt Barker our Entrepreneur in Residence, and the Founders Forum. The training sessions are ongoing with the next session happening on 12 noon GMT 25th February. We are also offering a Mentoring Program to a small group of UK based individuals.

We'll be following up our State of Open Reports from last year with another three reports.

As a Day One Member of GAIA-X, Open UK has been asked to lead on a possible UK hub. There will be an introductory session on this on 9 February, 2.30pm-4.00pm GMT. All are welcome. If interested in attending, please contact admin@openuk.uk.

Security and Sustainability Advisory Boards are being created and we welcome involvement from those interested in these areas. We’re already planning our second Open Technology for Sustainability Day and the Third Edition of the OpenUK Awards happening later this year.

In Learning and Skills, the Learning Team is growing, continuing to develop the Kids Camp with a further OpenUK digital glove inspired by MiMu give away and competition.

We are also working on an Apprenticeship Scheme Knowledge Module and University Modules for engineering, business and legal and regulatory students.

Honours List

We kicked off 2022 with the OpenUK New Year’s Honours List celebrating future generations of Open Technologists. The list is made up of individuals identified as being ones to watch in the UK in Open Source Software, Open Hardware and Open Data. All are earmarked as leading the next generation of Open Technology whether through social media, their jobs, community contributions, policy or in education.

Founders Forum Training and Mentoring

Watch Future Founders Training Session 1

Matt Barker, founder of JetStack is OpenUK’s Entrepreneur in Residence leading our Founders Forum. As a result of their initial findings report, OpenUK Founders Forum Training Program has been set up for anyone developing skills in open technology and business. 10 weekly sessions taking place digitally on Fridays at noon led by the Founders Forum and Legal Group, people with experience at the coal face of Open Tech.

Whilst the sessions have started, it’s not too late to get involved and you can watch videos of past sessions on our website.

SessionDateTopic
121 JanuaryIntroductory session: Why found an Open Source Business?
228 JanuaryProduct Market Fit / Developing a Product
34 FebruaryCorporate Structure and IP considerations for Open Tech businesses, Open Source Licensing
425 FebruaryGo To Market / Marketing
54 MarchRevenue Generation and Models / Pricing and Packaging
611 MarchFounder Experience, Raising and Runway
718 MarchContracts and Open Source
825 MarchCommunity, DevRel, Foundations
91 AprilPeople, Hiring and Scaling
1029 AprilPitch your start up to our Founder Forum Founders

Future Founders Mentoring Program

The Entrepreneur in Residence and Founders Forum are offering mentoring to a small group of UK based individuals. Interested Founders or potential Founders will be selected from applications received with mentees matched with our team for one to one mentoring sessions and to offer support for the evolution of an ever stronger UK Open Technology business ecosystem.

Find out more on our website

Apply here for mentoring

State of Open Reports

In 2021, we released the State of Open Reports in three phases looking at open source software in the UK:

  • Phase One: Literature Review and Interviews with industry leaders
  • Phase Two: Quantitative Survey demonstrating uptake across business
  • Phase Three: Economic Analysis of Value generated by Open Source

These reports not only showed that open source software contributed up to £43.15bn to UK GDP, it also highlighted some great use cases including Starling in Phase Two and the energy sector in Phase Three. We also conducted a survey and the results are in Phase Two. All three reports can be read here.

For 2022, we will be carrying out work on another three reports:

  • Open Data
  • Open Hardware
  • Open Source Software - follow up from 2021

Find out more

Find out more about OpenUK’s activities on our website and press. Follow us on social media or join our newsletter for updates.