[Linux-aus] EU Commission Study Finds You'll Save Money Switching to Free and Open Source Software

[anthony hornby]

>From Groklaw:

The EU Commission's Final Report on its "Study on the Economic impact of
open source software on innovation and the competitiveness of the
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector in the EU" is
now available on its policy documents, publications and studies page as
a PDF. 

http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/ict/studies/publications.htm
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/ict/policy/doc/2006-11-20-flossimpact.pdf


I thought you'd be interested in the conclusion regarding total cost of
ownership. 

Is it true that switching to Open Source will cost you more than staying
with Windows, as Microsoft's "Get the Facts" page claims? No. The study
found: 

        "Our findings show that, in almost all the cases, a transition
        toward open source reports of savings on the long term – costs
        of ownership of the software products." 

But what about training costs? Doesn't that remove the benefits? No, the
report found:

        "Costs to migrate to an open solution are relevant and an
        organization needs to consider an extra effort for this. However
        these costs are temporary and mainly are budgeted in less than
        one year." 

So there you are. 

Oh, and what about loss of productivity if you switch to OpenOffice.org?
None:

        "Our findings report no particular delays or lost of time in the
        daily work due to the use of OpenOffice.org.... OpenOffice.org
        has all the functionalities that public offices need to create
        documents, spreadsheets, and presentations." 

It has another advantage, the study found: it supports ODF:

        "OpenOffice.org is free, extremely stable, and supports the ISO
        Open Document Standard." 


Here's the relevant section with the conclusions of the study:

***************************************************************

12.7. Conclusions Our analysis has been performed on six organizations
in different European countries. The majority of them are public bodies.
The organizations have followed different types of migration on the base
of their context. 

We have investigated the costs of migration, and the cost of ownership
of the old and the new solution differentiating them between the costs
of purchasing and the costs of ownership of the software solutions.
Special attention has been put on the intangible nature of the costs.
Costs have been classified in categories defined trough existing studies
and selected by a top down approach called Goal Question Metric. This
instrument has been also used to define the questionnaires used to
collect the data. 

Our findings show that, in almost all the cases, a transition toward
open source reports of savings on the long term – costs of ownership of
the software products. 

Costs to migrate to an open solution are relevant and an organization
needs to consider an extra effort for this. However these costs are
temporary and mainly are budgeted in less than one year. The major
factor of cost of the new solution – even in the case that the open
solution is mixed with closed software – is costs for peer or ad hoc
training. These are the best example of intangible costs that often are
not foreseen in a transition. On the other hand not providing a specific
training may cause and adverse attitude toward the new technology.
Fortunately those costs are limited in time and are not strictly linked
to the nature of the new software adopted. 

We also investigated the productivity of the employees in using
Microsoft office and OpenOffice.org. Office suites are widely used and
are a good test bed and representative for a comparison on issues like
effort and time spent in the daily routine of work. Delays in the task
deliveries may have a bigger impact than costs on the organization's
management. Our findings report no particular delays or lost of time in
the daily work due to the use of OpenOffice.org. 

                         12.7.1. Considerations

With our analysis we achieve a good level of understanding of the costs,
benefits and productivity of a transition. The following are the
considerations we have drawn upon. 

1. Before buying, upgrading proprietary office software one needs
consider that: 

OpenOffice.org has all the functionalities that public offices need to
create documents, spreadsheets, and presentations 

Upgrading office programs is time-consuming and expensive. It requires
installation time, potential document conversions, and new training. It
also poses a risk because some documents containing code or macros may
not be readable anymore 

OpenOffice.org is free, extremely stable, and supports the ISO Open
Document Standard. 

-- 
Mr Anthony Hornby
Associate Director, Resources and Technology
Library and Information Access
Charles Darwin University (CRICOS 300K)
Phone: +61 8 8946 6011
Email: anthony.hornby at cdu.edu.au.no-spam
(remove the .no-spam)

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little 
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."