Obviously a company that’s taken in $30.5 million dollars needs an exit, and for the Zimbra Group $350 million from Yahoo! is not a bad chunk of change. However, as a user of Zimbra, I can’t help but feel a little apprehensive about a great open-source product going under the wing of a company without a lot of OSS cred. More troubling is the phrasing of the post on the Zimbra Blog stating that “We are committed to keeping the current source open and available for use.” No mention is made of the continued existence of the open-source edition. Nor is open-source mentioned on Yahoo!’s press-release or on thier blog.
The Zimbra team’s already built a fantastic product, and one that I enjoy using every day. It’s the best self-hosted email client I’ve used and with the resources of Yahoo! it should get even better. Hopefully they’ll keep the open-source edition around for those that don’t need Blackberry and Exchange integration. It’ll be interesting to see in the coming weeks how the product progresses and what changes, if any, occur with the licensing.
Updated:
Zimbra’s latest blog post clarifies their position and suggests that there are no imminent changes planned to their licensing scheme.
