The European Commission has opened a public consultation on open source softwarea step that lays the foundations for the European Union to continue advancing in digital sovereignty. To do this, on this occasion, the organization is committed to independence of their developer communities from the platforms of big technology Americans.
In the text of this consultation, open until February 3, the Commission admits that the EU’s dependence on technological suppliers outside the region has become a matter of strategic responsibility. This is because it limits choice, weakens the European Union’s competitiveness and creates risks in the supply chain, from critical infrastructure to cloud services.
The Commission points out that dependence on suppliers from outside the EU makes it more complicated for organizations in the region to control their digital stack. In addition, they also point out that this can open the door to security and resilience problems in different sensitive sectors.
According to the query, open source offers a way out of this situation, through various digital solutions that are described as “safe and high quality» and that can become viable alternatives to proprietary platforms. He also emphasizes that “A strong and developed open source sector can effectively contribute to further innovation in the EU, accelerate standardization and strengthen the EU’s international competitiveness, protecting its sovereignty and ensuring its economic prosperity, security, resilience and global influence.«.
For Brussels, innovators, startups and SMEs are the main drivers of open source, thanks to the solutions and products they launch on the market. Furthermore, they recognize that between 70% and 90% of modern software depends on open source components, and that although EU companies and developers are responsible for a large part of its development, its commercial and strategic value often ends up in the hands of large technology companies from outside the region.
To try to avoid this, the Commission has confirmed that is going to draw up a new plan for the EU on open sourcein addition to reviewing its 2020-2023 strategy, which focuses above all on how EU bodies use and share code internally.
The EU changes its mentality regarding open source
This time it seems that Brussels wants to treat open source as a political and economic assetdirectly related to sovereignty, competitiveness and cybersecurity. Furthermore, among its advantages is that it can help streamline operations in supply chains, in addition to facilitating the tracking and detection of vulnerabilities.
The aforementioned plan will cover, among other things, the cloud, AI, cybersecurity, Internet technologies and open hardware. Also industrial applications, from those intended for vehicles to those designed for manufacturing. On this occasion, in addition, the focus will be on scaling and deployment, and it will not be another round of experimental projects.
On the other hand, in the European Union they are aware that the problem regarding the gap between the development of open source software, its deployment to the market, and who ultimately benefits from it, is not solved solely with financing and innovation programs, as has been done until now. The EU has so far supported various projects, but many have had all kinds of difficulties in moving from the funding phase based on scholarships and subsidies to the free market.
To avoid this, the Commission has proposed several measures, among which there are incentives for users, both from the public administration and the private sector, to participate in the initial phases of projects, provide support to EU companies dedicated to open source and help startups at risk of failure as they grow. In addition, the proposal also calls for support for new business models for companies and foundations dedicated to open source, which include public-private agreements.
The objective of the initiative, therefore, is promote the development of secure and quality open source solutions. Also address the problems that projects have moving forward, such as their level of usability, challenges in development, software supply chain security, governance and code maintenance.
