Guest: Gabriele Columbro (LinkedIn)
Organization: Linux Foundation Europe
Show: The Source
Topic: Open Source

Europe’s open source ecosystem is rich with innovation and technical talent, but it still faces a major challenge: turning that innovation into sustainable commercial success. In this conversation, Gabriele Columbro, General Manager of Linux Foundation Europe, explores why Europe’s open source efforts often don’t translate into large-scale businesses—and what needs to change.

Columbro explains that open source adoption itself is not the issue. Whether or not it’s acknowledged, open source makes up between 80 and 95 percent of software applications worldwide. The real gap, he says, lies in how Europe leverages open source strategically. Despite having deep grassroots contributions and a vibrant developer community, Europe lacks the commercial infrastructure needed to turn that innovation into growth.

“I was on a panel with three open source founders — all of them Europeans,” Columbro recalls. “Each eventually moved to the U.S. for better funding and exit opportunities.” That’s the first major barrier: an underdeveloped venture capital ecosystem. European founders often leave in search of the resources and market dynamics that allow open source companies in the U.S. to thrive. Without a stronger funding climate, Europe struggles to create scalable commercial ecosystems around its own technologies.

The second barrier, Columbro argues, is cultural and organizational. While European developers contribute heavily to open source, large European enterprises lag far behind their American and Asian counterparts in financial and labor contributions. “Globally, enterprises contribute roughly $7.7 billion to open source,” Columbro explains. “But if you look at the top contributors, there are almost no European companies in the top ten—and only two in the top twenty.”

This gap stems from a lack of C-suite understanding of open source’s strategic role. Many European executives still see it as a cost center or a community initiative rather than a driver of competitiveness, innovation, and sovereignty. As a result, Europe’s strongest industries—automotive, telecom, energy, and manufacturing—aren’t investing in maintainers, foundations, or open source R&D at the same scale as their global peers.

The consequences go beyond business. When innovation happens in Europe but the value is commercialized elsewhere, the continent loses economic leverage and technological independence. “That’s where the virtuous cycle breaks,” says Columbro. “We produce incredible grassroots innovation, but the value gets extracted somewhere else.”

Columbro believes the solution lies in building a stronger bridge between open source communities, investors, and policymakers. Foundations like the Linux Foundation Europe can play a pivotal role by helping align funding incentives with community goals—creating an environment where European innovation leads to European growth.