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Sneak Preview: Nuxeo Marketplace & Nuxeo Admin Center

August 19th, 2010

I’m very excited and proud to present the new big thing for the ECM market! We’ve been working on this plan for the last few months and now it’s ready for our community to preview. We believe it can change things in the content management market and drive a whole new innovation stream from developers!

We are releasing, as preview, Nuxeo Marketplace & the Nuxeo Admin Center. As part of our Nuxeo Connect subscription program, the Marketplace is a new way to distribute plug-ins and apps on our ECM platform and packaged products. The Admin Center is a new administration console, featuring a great software update dashboard to install and manage upgrades, patches and new features, streamlining the management of a Nuxeo application.

Nuxeo Marketplace provides a completely new experience to install new features (packages) and customization/configurations in a Nuxeo application. Leveraging our platform’s architecture and extension model, the Marketplace offers a way to package those plugins and distribute them easily to enhance our products (Nuxeo EP, Nuxeo DM, Nuxeo DAM, or Nuxeo Case Management Framework).

The key point? It is not just another app marketplace! Most app markets today require a complete download, install, test cycle. We’ve made this easy for Nuxeo customers. We have focused on the experience, integrating it throughout the Nuxeo Connect services, allowing installation of new apps or plug-ins directly from your application.

We are delivering a completely integrated environment for our customers to browse, install and try new features, download Nuxeo Studio templates, etc. Installing new features and deploying a customization literally takes seconds and doesn’t even require a restart in most cases! THAT is innovation in ECM when most of our competing friends still take weeks to install and test new features… let alone create the customization… ;-)

More than just a new product, more than another new service, it’s the logical fusion of our products and services to make your job easier.

Want to join the preview and help shape the direction of Nuxeo Marketplace? Watch the sneak peak video and try it by yourself!

Key benefits

For developers, a way better to serve your users:

  • browse and install new features from the Marketplace into your Nuxeo product
  • easily upgrade your product and related add-ons
  • easily install software patches delivered by Nuxeo’s support team

For partners and contributors:

  • create apps, features, add-ons for Nuxeo’s product and access our install base (application builders decide – free or priced as you wish)
  • easily distribute updates and collect revenue from what you’re doing

For system integrators and developers:

  • benefit from a completely unified experience, plus support and customization with Nuxeo Studio
  • quickly deploy your Studio-based customization

How does this work?

The Nuxeo Admin Center lets you link your product with your Nuxeo Connect subscription (if you don’t have one, you can start a 30-day trial ). Once your application is registered, the Update Center is activated.

The Update Center manages packages: it can notify, download, install, upgrade and remove them. The Update Center communicates available updates (and patches) for installed software, fetching and delivering Nuxeo Studio-based apps/customization and installing packages from the Marketplace.

On the Nuxeo Connect side, Nuxeo Marketplace hosts the package repository and offers a central place to browse available packages via the web-based gallery of apps and plug-ins.

Want to create new packages?

Creating new packages is very easy when you have done plug-ins for a Nuxeo application. You just need to bundle them with an install script and the resources to create a new package suitable for the Marketplace.

How to help? Want to know more?

Timeline?

The Nuxeo Marketplace and Admin Center are available today for members of our community, contributors, partners and customers for preview, testing, improvement and package creation. Nuxeo Connect customers can benefit from this update system now, receiving bug fixes and patches from our support team for Nuxeo DM 5.3.2.

The general availability release of the Nuxeo Marketplace will be done for Nuxeo DM 5.4, at the end of September. We expect to have many packages available by that time and directly available with this version.

Let’s get started!

EB.

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Posted in Business, ECM, Software

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Business of open source: my take on “open core”

April 1st, 2010

The “open core” debate has been around since the inception of the model itself, and gained significant adoption among so-called “commercial open source companies”. The debate is heating a bit these day, and I got inspired by 2 recent blog posts from Brian Prentice and Matt Aslett. I advise to read both posts to understand the reactions bellow. :-)

I think a lot about business models leveraging open source as it’s what makes our business run and I’m deeply convinced that “open core” is fundamentally flawed. This conviction has been formed by real world observations: running a real business for several years now. And I’m happy to see high-profile analysts reach the same conclusion with a sharper analysis and better process! :-)

About Sales & Marketing Savings

James Dixon from Pentaho argues — not suprisingly — that open core is the right model because it reduces the sales and marketing costs to distribute the software. And that might be true. But it is not linked to open core neither to open source, intrinsically. It’s linked to the internet distribution model and the rise of the web as a way for new and small companies to become known.

I would also add that I think the open core market is less powerful as a distribution model than a freemium (or free trial)-one based leveraging proprietary software. The reduction in sales and marketing spend is more related to the online distribution of the software than the open source aspect of “a software core”. So, of course, when you distribute a software online, you have to make it easy to install (hence improve packaging compared to traditional proprietary offerings). But it is really linked to internet-enabled distribution, not to the open access to the source code of the software.

Atlassian (or Skype) might be the flagship of success for this model… without being open source at all (but while contributing to it)!

About the “open core” model

With an open core model, you have to exclude/remove features (hence value) from the open source software to in order to preserve your business: you could be forced to even limit innovation in the open source branch because it could damage your business. It does not leverage any benefits that should be derived from the open nature of the code — which is the very core aspect of open source. It only leverage free distribution not the open aspect of the source code.

I would add that a subscription-based model (where subscription is for maintenance and support services) is superior on the long-term because it drives the company to align and organize itself around the value created for its customer. The more the customer deploy and benefit from the software, the more revenue goes to the vendor. So I think it’s a great way to align vendors and users on the same value stream.

Also, using an open source license does not require free download (advocated by open core users): RHAT is, I think, considered as the most successful company in the open source world. Yet their software is not freely downloadable, while 100% open source.

Hybrid?

I read a lot about “hybrid models“, based some blend of proprietary and open source software, to justify/support an “open core” model. I don’t believe in this at all. Of course, proprietary software is not going away anytime soon. It’s a valuable and proven business model that works and can deliver value to customers when properly applied. Same for open source: it’s here to stay for good. But the “open core” model offer no long-term benefit for customers: it just blurs the real value of open source for them, only leveraging the distribution channel it implies for the vendor benefit.

I believe in clear business models. Successful companies use clear business models because that’s what enable trust from customers. Open core is not one of them: there is no clear line between open source / proprietary, neither serious justification for the customer. Open core is just the good old proprietary model, nothing new here. All vendors uses open source software today!

From a higher perspective, I believe that the whole IT market is moving toward service-based approaches — SaaS paved the way — because it aligns customer value with vendor revenue. That’s why we — at Nuxeo — won’t use the open core model even if it could increase short term revenue. We’re here to stay and we believe that basing our revenue stream on the value we create for our customers is the best way to create sustainable growth.


Cheers,

EB.

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Posted in Business, Open Source, Software

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Is there room for Nuxeo in the mature and crowded ECM market?

March 15th, 2010

While exchanging with a well-recognized and successful industry expert about our differentiators and the market we are in. Since they popup frequently, I thought it might be interesting to publish the answer.


Bazaar-istanbul

ECM is a mature and crowded market. Is there really room for anything more than a niche player at this late stage in the game?

Hegemonic vendors

At a macro-level, the enterprise content market is composed by 5 hegemonic vendors (OpenText, EMC, IBM, Oracle, Microsoft) and a set of minor ones (~15 notable), after a strong and fast consolidation of this market. Gartner says: 3 top vendors have 52% of the ECM market. The Triad of ECM? ;-)

As many vendors have skipped investment in technology aggregating software from their acquisitions (with the notable exception of Microsoft) much of the current batch of software has been designed 15 years ago and hasn’t evolved much. They have forgotten they are in engineering, not retail. In this world of lean, on-demand, instant-on, the major ECM payers still talk literally in days or weeks to install their software. It’s faster to setup a whole virtual datacenter processing and storing terabytes of data on the Amazon Cloud than setting up a vanilla ECM system!

On top of this technology breakdown, many of these acquisitions have been poorly integrated, to say the least (with a special mention to OpenText on this side). And the pace of the recent consolidation has created a disturbance in the market.

Those two combined dynamics enable new vendors with good technology and the right go-to-market approach to enter the ECM arena, tickle the incumbents and rise, and bring some fresh air and fun to this market.

Perspective shift from customers

We see important shifts in how customers evaluate and choose ECM platforms:

  • More and more Architects are actively involved in the choice of next-generation ECM platforms (not only business users / archive managers) and are putting it at the core of their information system. This sets high expectations in terms of software architecture, integration capabilities or flexibility and technology stack.

  • They need to update systems deployed in the ’00s because incumbent vendors are not supporting those versions anymore => the cost of upgrading is high and they are looking for alternatives. Often we can offer efficient and better replacement for those systems for a fraction of the price of the ongoing maintenance. Let alone the license fees…

  • Given the lack of technical investment and the legacy of major ECM platforms, implementation is complex and expensive => we can do better with today’s technology. Monolithic is no where near the state-of-the-art of software-and Architects care because it directly impacts their ability to make these ECM platforms meet the new business challenges.

Move fast, commoditize legacy, create value with the rest

I really believe that the market maturity combined with the legacy technologies of monolithic players is a key advantage for us: we are disrupting the market by commoditizing the technology (platform) and deriving value from this commoditization.

We target what hurts: the fat and comfortable maintenance stream. We target it with more flexible, up-to-date technology and a company organized to provide superior service for support & maintenance as our customers actually deploy and use our products. That’ll tickle! ;-)

So yes, I’m firmly convinced that there is a room for new players, like us. And timing seems just right for a big one. The market needs to evolve and renew, in the best interest of customers. And they well deserve it, given the challenges of the knowledge era that just starts…

That’s going to be a tough ride. But… feels fun too!

Cheers,

EB.

2 comments »

Posted in Business, ECM, Marketing, Open Source, Software

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Recruiting 2.0 @ Nuxeo – a real world story

December 17th, 2009

Dream-job-signal As you might have noticed, in September we (proudly) welcomed a new member of our executive team, Cheryl McKinnon has joined to lead our marketing, bringing many years of ECM experience from big name players.

Cheryl is a key member of our executive team and I am proud to have her on board: she brings deep knowledge of ECM alongside great sense or marketing. It’s a unusual hire for a company like Nuxeo. I believe the hiring process is a very interesting aspect of this story… It’s a total “2.0″ process.

Earlier this month, Cheryl organized and hosted a workshop for tech professionals who needed to get back into the job market – a move that ‘went viral’. She has lived the new Recruiting 2.0 experience and offered to share her learnings with others – because this is how we found her:

For several months I was thinking of finding a CMO to accelerate and strengthen our go-to-market strategy, as well add some serious brain power and experience in the field of ECM to our company. It wasn’t an active search at first – it took time to imagine the profile I was looking for. Once figured out, it became one of those sticky ideas I get sometimes… I had to fix this!

I considered several options to find the right person:

  1. Hunter Route -> great to find the typical “world-class marketing guy” but he/she might miss the twist that I was after. Plus I wasn’t sure I could properly explain the profile, let alone assuming the head hunter really gets it. :-)

  2. Wait for somebody to send a resume spontaneously -> can work, but I wasn’t confident in the exact timeline for obvious reasons! :-)

  3. Find her/him myself using my own (limited) resources.

As the first route seemed wrong (and/or too expensive) and the second one too uncertain I went for the third one and started to work on the topic.

I wanted an “ECM expert / Web 2.0 thinker / social media pundit / community-aware marketer”. That would have been the first brief for a head-hunter. Hence, I headed to LinkedIn: refined searches, careful manual review of profiles (including blog / twitter-feed reading).

Applying several rules: proper Linkedin profile, a professional blog, a twitter account, some activities in social media and communities of practice. But more than anything, I was looking for the “twist”, the small things, difficult to describe, that make a person right for a particular job at our company. The thing that makes your company special and that is so difficult to describe. I was looking for “Nuxeo’s CMO”, not “a CMO”.

I ended up with a very small hand-picked group of people that seemed to fit the profile. Next, I sent an intro email to explain the opportunity, got answers, (lot of) calls, in person meetings, explained and discussed about vision and strategy. Kind of a standard hiring process, actually, for a key position. With a difference, however, from the old times… I would never had been able to do it, just 5 years ago. LinkedIn, social media, blogs and twitter made that possible: find great people for key position in (close to) no time. Less time than describing such a complex profile and complex position to a head hunter actually.

I now use this approach for all key positions in the company: you don’t find us, we find you (well, if you find us that’s cool too…). The social web is just a wonderful opportunity for great companies to find great people and for great people to find great companies. It enables to hear the voice of the talents and connect with them, before the first interview. That’s a brand new way of seeing the hiring process. This would have been completely impossible just 5 years ago. And I don’t think we’re an isolated case, my wife has been hunted and hired the same way a few month ago (which is maybe what got me started with this approach, actually).

As a CEO, it’s the most valuable result I’m getting from social media: being able to connect and engage with great people that can join and strengthen the company, at no cost (except participating to the system, being very open and transparent). I have access to a virtually unlimited pool of talent: just need to pay attention and look for people. This is a huge opportunity, totally new compared to what our predecessors had to deal with. And a great threat for those who don’t get it.

We’re living amazing times…

EB.

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Posted in Business, Marketing, Recruitment, Web/Tech

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Open Source vs. Proprietary Software Platforms: the Market’s Perspective

September 30th, 2009

Matt Asay, in the good post "Open source is a platform, not a product", is claiming the end of the platform wars because open source has won. Clearly, open source platforms are winning. Just take Eclipse (development apps and desktop apps), Java, Android, etc.

But saying that open source platforms are winning doesn't mean the platform wars are over. I would say the contrary. Platform wars will continue, and this helps innovation (if the wars stop, then I would worry actually). We'll see a lot of open source platform wars. Competition rules the world! :-)

The question is: why are open source platforms winning? I don't think it's because of their flexibility. Flexibility is a feature of a software platform open source or not. Being open source doesn't give you inherent flexibility, goodness or ease of use. Of course, flexible platforms win, and often they happen to be open source. But not always. :-)

I think the core reason lies in the intrinsic economic efficiency: open source is a better way to produce software platforms from a market perspective. It's just more efficient at the macro-economic level, factoring cost and fostering collaboration. Hence, it wins. Period.

I believe the economic efficiency aspect is key in the success of open source software, especially for platforms. And it's not pure magic. Open source licensing scheme and open development models enable collaboration between self-interested entities, which can combine forces as they need within a clear legal framework, and such without a complex initial collaboration setup and big contracts negotiation.

And as platforms are inherently meant to serve a wide range of needs and people, open source reveals its superior nature: it enables great collaboration between actors using the platform, hence aggregating their work to advance the platform.

This virtuous cycle is clearly shown by great successes such as the Eclipse Platform (the more vendors joined the game, the more Eclipse became the de facto platform for dev tools), Apache projects, WordPress as a blogging platform, Firefox and WebKit as browser platforms (on different fronts), and the list goes on…

And, open source doesn't kill innovation. Quite the contrary – thanks to the inherent openness of the model and the competitive nature built-in (forks are an extreme example) – open source fosters great innovation.

So yes, as Matt says, for any given market segment, open source platforms win, are about to, or at least represent a significant share. But it's not because of their flexibility or because of their open source license. It's because the open source licensing scheme catalyzed by an open development model bring so much efficiency that it beats any proprietary competitor.

That's economic reality, not software architecture. And it's a lot stronger!

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Posted in Business, Open Source, Software

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