Company Fact Sheet



 

]project-open[ is an open-source project started by German software engineers in 2003.  In 2012, by establishing "Project Open Business Solutions S.L." in Barcelona, Spain the founders created a formal organization to support ]po['s continued growth and expansion. Project Open Business Solutions, S.L. is a privately owned and financed entity.

The Team

]po['s core team consists of three veteran German software engineers:

  • Frank Bergmann (frank.bergmann@project-open.com):
    Frank has more than 20 years experience in the IT business. He has been the CTO of an Internet startup developing B2B marketplaces and has worked as project manager and software architect in more then 10 major projects. He holds a Dipl.-Ing. degree from RWTH-Aachen and a MBA degree from ESADE business school.

  • Klaus Hofeditz (klaus.hofeditz@project-open.com):
    Klaus's versatile background is based on 20 years of work and study in the field of information technology and operations in Germany, Great Britain, France, the United States and Spain. He has worked for several consulting companies in the banking and food sector and was the director of Applications Development for a leading online marketing research company in San Francisco, working with clients such as Microsoft, Netscape, Oracle, HP and other global IT players. Klaus holds a computer science degree from the University of Applied Sciences in Giessen, Germany.

  • Malte Sussdorff (malte.sussdorff@project-open.com):
    With more than 20 years experience in creating online communities, Malte's background in both computer science as well as business administration has helped clients in the non profit and corporate world to enhance their internal processes and external communication. He has held the posts of lead developer (elected by the community) and software architect for a large Open Source Toolkit and was project manager for IT and the director of Business Development at an internet startup. He has founded three successful IT startups both in Germany and India and acts as a consultant for EU projects on E-Learning. Malte holds a Dipl.-Kfm. degree from the University of Hamburg.

  • Other Collaborators:
    There are a considerable number of external consultants and developers working for ]po[ on a regular basis. Most of them work at ]po[ partner companies, while others belong to one of the open-source networks associated with ]po[, particularly OpenACS and AOLServer.

Achievements & Awards

  • Optaros.com says: “3 stars – mature” enterprise readiness

  • SourceForge.net: Ranking between #50-200

  • Heise.de says: ]po[ is #4 open-source ERP/CRM application in Germany.
    The first three applications are SugarCRM, Vtiger and LXOffice, which are no real ERP systems. Compiere, Adempiere and OpenBravo are ranked far below ]po[.

  • Ohloh.net says: ]project-open[ is the world's largest open-source application with about 1 million LoC (Lines of Code).

  • Common Sense Advisory says: “]po[ is the #1 application of for the business management of translation organizations”. Commons Sense Advisory is the #1 market research company in the translation industry.

  • Heise Open Business Case: Cambridge Tech Partners Success Story
    (www.heise.de/open/artikel/115281)

Customers

  • There are about 6,000 companies in 30 countries using ]po[ to run their business in 2013.

  • About 200,000 users are connecting to ]po[ servers regularly (including freelancers).

  •  ]po[ (V3.5) has been downloaded more than 80,000 times from SourceForge.


Distinguished customers include:

  • Cambridge Technology Partners – More then 200 consultants today use ]po[, instead of Oracle Finance (CTP was part of Novell before a management buyout).

  • Basler Kantonalbank – Their 300+ IT department uses ]po[ for Invoicing, Project, Change and Timesheet-Management.

  • VAW Arvato S.L. (Bertelsmann Group) – More then 60 users use ]po[ as the company's ERP system.

  • Catalyst Management Services Pvt Ltd – Over 60 employees of this Bangalore,India based NGO use ]po[ as the main ERP and EPM tool. New Expense and Business Development modules were developed for them tailored to their specific needs

  • COMSYS Services LLC (NASDAQ: CITP)

     

Business Sectors

]po[ has large numbers of customers in the following business sectors:

  • General, Strategic & Financial Consulting companies

  • IT Departments and Service Providers (ITSM/ITIL)

  • PMO - Project Management Offices    

  • R&D and Engineering

The single ]po[ product serves all of these sectors without modification thanks to its configurable architecture.

Open-Source Communities

OpenACS.org represents the base platform of ]po[. Technically, ]po[ consists of a number of extension packages to the OpenACS Community Platform. OpenACS currently has ~10.000 members and an estimated ~200 active developers.

AOLserver.com represents the application server for ]po[. AOLserver is owned/maintained by AOL.com, where AOLserver is used as the core of its technology stack. AOL open-sourced AOLserver in 2001.

DotLrn.org is an e-learning application based on OpenACS. DotLrn and ]po[ share about 60% of their respective code. Areas of collaboration include the development of OpenACS.org “core” and usability.

OpenACS “Neighbour” Companies

]po[ is not the only company who has built a product based on the OpenACS platform.

[Quest.ie] is a leading provider of Grant Management applications (grantmanagementsoftware.com). ]po[ and AIMS share about 60% of their code. Areas of collaboration include Workflow and the SQL metadata system.

[Oasisoftware.com] has developed the “Alter” Accounting/ERP system based on OpenACS.

Partners

There are ~40 partner companies in ~20 countries redistributing ]project-open[. These partner companies are usually small or medium IT consulting companies with an affinity for open-source software.

PR Contact

For additional information please contact (English, German & Spanish): press@project-open.com


  Contact Us
  Project Open Business Solutions S.L.

Calle Aprestadora 19, 12o-2a

08902 Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona)

Spain

 Tel Europe: +34 609 953 751
 Tel US: +1 415 200 2465
 Mail: info@project-open.com