Fernando Almeida

Creation of Value with Open Source Software in the Telecom Field: How to Profit from Open Source? Fernando Almeida

Creating value with open source software is a considerable challenge, but also a great opportunity for any telecommunications company. To help companies in this task, this dissertation extends and instantiates the generic Open Source business roles model proposed by Eurescom: to take into consideration the new emergent technologies in the market such as, IPv6, IMS, VoIP and Ad-hoc Networks; to facilitate the relationships between universities/research centers and private companies; and to be easily explored by technologic-based start-up companies. The extended model presented in this dissertation proposes ten roles and certain relationships between the protagonists of the model and its instantiations. The Open Source Consultant, Quality Certification Entity, Training Provider and Portal Provider were new roles introduced in this extension. Furthermore, the new extended Open Source business roles model is instantiated for three representative and emergent scenarios: unified communications solution, VoIP solution and IMS based services. The Osterwalder methodology is used to describe and assess the application of the framework for each considered scenario.