Open Source Readiness

Financial services firms face a variety of barriers, both real and perceived, that impede adoption of Open Source software and related software development practices. These obstacles include:

• Corporate strategy considerations on competitive advantage and protecting trade secrets
• Legal & regulatory concerns or incompatible internal policies
• Inhospitable technical environments & resistance from corporate IT departments
• Cultural friction & open source myths 

FINOS helps firms overcome these challenges with its Open Source Readiness Project, focused on enabling financial services organizations and employees to be first class citizens in OSS Communities. The group has produced several valuable practical resources for firms developing their open source strategy and process:

• The Open Source License Compliance Handbook is a guide for complying with a wide range of open source licenses in common use cases. It's an invaluable resource for enabling developers to manage the most common compliance tasks without unnecessary legal and compliance review. Download the Handbook.
• The Reference FOSS Policy is a comprehensive model corporate policy for consuming, contributing to, and publishing open source software. It's a great starting point for firms adopting their first open source policy or revising an existing one. Download it!
• Our whitepaper on Business Value of Open Source in Financial Services lays out the business case for open source engagement and is a helpful aid for pitching open source to decision-makers on the business side of finance firms.

The Open Source Readiness Project (OSR) is open to everyone and welcomes participation from any organization. The group meets on a bi-weekly basis and, led by project lead Aaron Williamson, features world class open source experts as well as lively conversations among financial firms legal, compliance and technical peers, providing invaluable guidance to enable institutional open source readiness.  

A goal of the Foundation is to collect, curate, and share leading practices and practical tools that have helped financial services firms and leading companies from other industries successfully engage in  Open Source. Through the Open Source Readiness Project and the Open Developer Platform we provide a venue and a reference model  to deeper open source engagement in a secure and compliant way,

In addition to the open forum provided by the Open Source Readiness Project, FINOS works proactively with his Members to achieve strategic, efficient and compliant open source software engagement.

As a FINOS Member, you'll receive FINOS team support and guidance on both open source readiness and broader engagement with our FINOS Projects and the community -- just one of many Membership Benefits.