 Hi, this is Hosapil Bhartiya and we are here at CubeCon EU in Amsterdam and today we have with us once again Gabriele Colombrou, general manager of LF Europe. Really, first of all, it's great to have you back on the show. Nice to see you again Thanks for having me. Yeah, and last time when we talked was when the you know The LF Europe was launched a couple of other projects were launched and they were talking to you We're talking about hey, these are very early days, you know So in few months we'll have better picture. So let's get that better picture now. Okay Yeah, it's been a pretty pretty interesting six months. Let's say As you know, I still sort of divide my life between Linux Foundation Europe and and I still am the executive director of Fino So we're a work FinTech open source Foundation, but as far as Europe goes has been You know six months of growth We have just passed hundred members in in Linux Foundation Europe, which I think is a really great sign of you know Fit for the European market and the need for an open source foundation Like us sort of on a global scale We've launched two projects Silva is the first one that we launched in December is a really really promising Cloud collaboration across the largest telco vendors in Europe I think a great example of the type of sort of vertical projects that that we see you know As a good archetype of projects for for European collaboration You know given that the strength of many verticals like telco in in Europe and then open wallet foundation I think again the other really good example of more of a cross industry horizontal project providing an engine for You know a much more. I would say human centric Wallet identity very much aligned with the you know, I EU Priorities around aid us to the the European ID So having two really good projects and we have you know many more in the pipeline for the year What else we've You know, I think one of the main learnings has been that the engagement of the public sector I think we were talking about it in September You know, it was you know hard hypothesis that that you need to engage much more the European sector Sorry, the public sector in Europe and that has proven to be the case. We've been You know working much closed much more close in Brussels. We're following the cyber resilience act As you know and the potential concerns for the open source community. We have a call to action out there So all you know, it's been a very very Busy six months talking about Europe. Most of the open source actually the whole kernel also the most developers here culturally Also Europe is more open source friendly Then you know, it goes all the back to our schooling and you know, the whole system Which is available here. So when it comes to growing the membership, I think what what kind of I mean Of course, you you started, you know in Europe So what kind of a stark contrast that you've seen here versus it states? You're absolutely right Europe has I think a stronger grassroots sort of open source culture Oftentimes to an extent also in stark contrast with the sort of corporate open source if that makes sense I do believe though that you know, one of the Success factors of the Linux Foundation Europe would be to really bring together these two souls of open source If that makes sense, you know, ultimately, there's a lot of talk about sustainability of open source and You know without the Large amount of corporate funding that has been poured into open source over the last, you know two decades We would be probably in a much more dire place in terms of sustainability and security world supply chain So sure, there is a sort of a cultural difference in terms of what I call the romantic aspect of open source that that sort of has Europeans we certainly believe in and that's what I grew up in in my early open source days I think related to the second sort of major difference is that you know unsurprisingly a lot of the innovation and Sort of technology landscape in the US it's driven, you know out of the public Sorry out of the private sector, you know, most of the innovation comes out of big tech or you know smaller startups BC backed type of organizations I Think in Europe we see much less, you know, of course as a of a, you know pure play Technology companies, you know as AP and a few others get lab You know Spotify maybe are the three sort of big examples of technology pure technology companies in Europe. That's sort of the large-scale And so I think instead We'll see a lot of developments on Different verticals, you know as verticals like telco finance healthcare Automotive they all undergo the digital transformation They all understand that you know open source is a key pillar of any technology centric organization And so I expect more of this, you know, silver like Vertical type of collaborations And I think again the second aspect is the much stronger You know for good in good and bad that's much stronger engagement of the public sector Coming down with regulations like the cyber residency act the AI act the Interoperability act even the DMA and the SA digital markets act and digital services act so Basically, I see that the open source community need to be much more responsive and attentive to what's coming down in terms of regulation And this is maybe kind of another sort of Different aspect with respect to the US the US is much more again private sector driven So a lot of activities are going on from the public sector as well But the point that you earlier made which is really important is that there are a lot of gross gross weapon movement going on Big companies they may not be doing as much open source as they should and then public sector So but it is all disjointed So I think that's where the rule Linux foundation is going to play is to bring all these different parties together Because they do love open source here. They do a lot of open source But there is no framework where they can work together. They're a lot of organizations They're a lot of you know, but they're all kind of fragmented So talk a bit about you know once again when we look at the next six months. Yes So, how are you planning to to bring it or does that question make sense? Oh, absolutely make sense almost like if we prepared it but Yeah, we are active in many fronts in really providing concrete vehicles for collaboration of the public sector I would say it's primarily sort of in three areas one is research We just published the fragmentation report that really talks about the role of open source and you know a better collaboration even amongst open source foundations in Fighting geopolitical fragmentation and really fighting also just the broader Fragmentation in the open source community and to your point between the different constituencies There's no reason why the public sector and the private sector Shouldn't be working together on an open source project. I'm seeing a lot of potential in that area in finance in sort of my my Other hat if that makes sense So we will be putting out more publications and more blueprints really to help the public sector Not only better engage but understand that it's not just about really consumption and procurement But it's really about driving Technology and social goals through open source and so I think the Linux Foundation Europe is very uniquely positioned to almost expand that very well Balanced governance that we already have for private sector and individuals You know to the public sector a third main actor actively contributing to an open source project case in point Open wallet foundation is actually creating a government advisory council Very much, you know, I can style And that's our first attempt to really create a clear body for the sort of public sector to at least advise Contribute participate to the open source projects Sort of early shifting left that engagement if that makes sense. So definitely research Governance and providing governance blueprints is something that we're actively working on. I think the third aspect is a much more mature Engagement with policy makers Not only of course through Linux Foundation Europe will be much more present present in in Brussels we've been present, you know, this week We're gonna put out a call to action to, you know, improve the cyber residency act as as written. We definitely feel a responsibility You know as the largest shared technology investment in the world to really represent The individual contributors that that stand potentially at risk with some of these regulations That said We also understand that, you know from the standpoint of lawmakers It's really hard to know who to talk to, you know, there's no, you know, when you're walking with a with a, you know With a proprietary product. Well, you go to a certain company you talk to the public affairs departments And you have a clear sort of interface and counterpart The open source community that's pretty amorphous concept in the sense that who should they be talking to and so We've done a couple of things in this area. We just, you know Under sign the letter early in the week with Eclipse and many other open source foundations really trying to create a coalition That can provide a really broad representation of the open source community You know an offering low makers an ongoing dialogue if that makes sense And secondly, this is news is gonna be a nice the next few days, but we are Launching an open source Congress. It's a conference that we're gonna be hosting in July in Geneva It is primarily to really build bridges across the different foundations and find, you know common areas of collaboration like policy like Open-source sustainability and hopefully that's gonna be a key Venue to continue also this conversation with the public sector What are the some of the hurdles that you see when you engage, you know And you did talk about when you go to a proprietary vendor you you have a throat to choke, you know But when it comes to open source, you know, which vendor which project and there are so many vendors for the same project So what are some of the hurdles that you're seeing when you go and talk to the private sector? Grassroot developers or public sector. We're like, hey, these are the barriers. Yeah, so I think you know, I'll start with the public sector I think look at reiterate that the Sort of interface is certainly something that we're working on, you know, there's certainly complexity from our side in Representing the open source community. I mean, of course the Linux Foundation is the largest Foundation out there. So we certainly cover a big slice But, you know, there's not a clear Interface at this point. We don't do lobbying. We don't You know, we're not a lobbying organization. We're actually working very closely with open forum Europe, which are, you know It's it's an open-source policy Think tank based in Brussels who really helped us also grow a Lot of the responses to the CRA and another act So we're certainly amping up sort of those relationships, but I think an element of Investment in this area is going to be important. In fact, we have our senior Community senior director of community development starting on June 1st. I can't share the name yet, but He is gonna come with a lot of experience in EU policy the economics of open source and I think that's gonna really help us have a more mature conversation with the lawmakers I think on the other side There's an element of Wouldn't say lack of understanding but certainly Limited understanding of the Complexity of the open-source ecosystem and just broadly release how modern software development and release processes work when you think about some of the potentially Negative impacts of the CRA again. I want to be very clear. We're very supportive of acts like this that Try to bolster You know open-source supply chain security and just generally software supply chain security I mean open SSF is the most egregious example of the investment of the left the work that we've done with the White House really corolling Big tech vendors in direct conversation with the White House really speaks volumes to it But you know when you think about the law is how it's currently written and and there's I Think a realization that again open source is not a Unilateral you need directional value chain, you know where you produce a piece of soft When you you know write a piece of software then sell it and then deliver value There's a lot of intermediate intermediaries in the process, you know foundations package managers code hosting like github or githlab and I think to an extent there is a little bit of a disconnect here in in Brussels where look open source on one hand is very much a pillar of the Digital decade the EU digital decade then this idea of the digital commons digital sovereignty Human-centered next-generation Internet so the EU at sort of senior level has a very positive outlook on open source and open collaboration strategic for sort of geopolitical Needs of the EU On the other hand when you see, you know laws like the CRA coming down with sort of gray areas where potentially contributors Foundations and packet managers risk to be liable Inadvertently really These actually risks You know undermining the very open source innovation that the EU is really trying to drive And so I think it comes down to education and it comes down to I think the LF has a really important role to play You know there's only so much you can do with abstract training Bringing case studies and success stories and and what we've been able to accomplish on a global scale in bringing together You know major projects at Kubernetes Linux things that the world run on Are gonna be very very useful. I think You know not just for open source But for the EU and their brother goals that they you know believe hinge on open source Yeah, really. Thank you so much for taking time today and talk with me about the updates on LF Europe And I would love to talk to you again soon. Thank you. Thank you so much. You're always a great fun to chat with. Thank you