Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Chetan Puttagunta and Jeremiah Lowin – Open Source Crash Course - [Invest Like the Best, EP.188]

Aug 25, 2020

Jeremiah Lowin, founder of Prefect.io, and Chetan Puttagunta, partner at Benchmark Capital, delve deep into the fascinating open-source software business model. They explain how companies can give away valuable tools for free while monetizing additional features, fostering community trust, and reshaping development approaches. The discussion covers the shift to cloud-based models, community engagement, and the potential of API-first strategies that democratize innovation. Their insights reveal how these principles can transcend software, offering lessons for various industries.

01:02:07

Creator website

Episode guests

Chetan Puttagunta

Jeremiah Lowin

AI Chapters

Episode notes

Intro

4min

The Open Source Advantage

9min

The Shift to Cloud: Open Source Business Models

15min

Navigating Open Source vs Closed Source Development

23min

Building Community Through Open Strategies

2min

Opportunities in Open Source: A New Era

7min

Unlocking Business Logic through API-First Open Source Models

3min

My guests this week are Jeremiah Lowin and Chetan Puttagunta. Jeremiah is the founder of Prefect.io, an open-source software company where my family and I are investors, and Chetan is a partner at Benchmark Capital. Both are past guests and good friends. I asked them on to help the audience understand the open source software business model. I’ve been fascinated with this model in which companies give a huge chunk of their work and value away for free to a community of developers, and then make money by building additional tools, functionality, and services on top of their free and open platform. While this may strike you as a wonky discussion on a niche software topic, I think it is valuable for everyone because the ideas can be applied to more than just code. I view much of my own activity as open-sourcing investment research and knowledge. It is also important because much of the world’s technology is built on top of open source projects. I hope you learn something new about this emerging category. Please enjoy.

This episode of Invest Like The Best is sponsored by Canalyst. Canalyst is the leading destination for public company data and analysis.

If you’re a professional equity investor and haven’t talked to Canalyst recently, you should give them a shout. Learn more and try Canalyst for yourself at canalyst.com/Patrick.

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Show Notes

(2:40) – (First question) – Originator business in open source software; Redhat

(5:51) – Why open source is valuable in building a business

(7:40) – Examples of the benefits of open source projects

(10:27) – Open source business models that produce the best results

(17:04) – Defensibility of open source companies

(25:02) – Mentoring younger founders on using open-source

(30:54) – The benefits of launching open-source

(36:41) – Building a digital community

(41:31) – Lessons from Open Source that can be applied to other businesses