We get asked this question often: "Do you actually make money with open source?"
The short answer is yes. The long answer requires unpacking a couple of misconceptions about what doing open source really means in 2025.
Open Source Doesn't Mean Free
Let's start here because this is the biggest misunderstanding. When you release an open source project, you're not giving away your work. You're making a specific choice: making transparent how what you've built actually works.
The code is available, yes. But that's not the point. The point is that anyone can verify what it does, how it does it, and if there are problems. In a world where software touches every aspect of people's lives (from healthcare to payments, from education to entertainment), transparency isn't altruism. It's responsibility.
And from a business standpoint? It's also a massive competitive advantage.
The Problem with the Closed Model
When you develop proprietary software, you have a clear objective: launch the next feature before your competitors. It works, sure. It's been the dominant model for decades.
But it has obvious limitations. No one from outside can tell you "this thing doesn't work as it should" or "have you considered this use case?". Worse: no one can ask you if what you're building is ethical, safe, or if it actually serves people.
In the world of AI, this approach becomes risky. We're building systems that make decisions instead of us, that influence hiring, loans, medical diagnoses. Doing this behind closed doors, without the possibility of scrutiny, doesn't make much sense anymore.
Security Doesn't Hide
Take cryptography. AES, RSA, the elliptic curves protecting your credit cards online: all open source. The algorithms are public.
Anyone can study them, analyze them, try to break them. Sounds counterintuitive, right? If you want something secure, shouldn't you keep it secret? No. It works exactly the opposite way. Security by obscurity is a bluff. Sooner or later someone finds the weak spot. And when that happens, you're screwed, because you have no idea how deeply the system's been compromised.
Open source cryptographic algorithms get tested by thousands of security researchers worldwide. If there's a hole, someone finds it. And it gets fixed before it becomes a serious problem. Bitwarden, one of the most widely used password managers in the world, works like this. The code is public. You can verify exactly how your passwords are managed. And that's precisely why people trust it. Transparency isn't the problem. It's the solution.
How the Open Source Business Model Works
Linux is open source. It runs on virtually all the world's servers. Android is open source. It runs on billions of devices. Kubernetes is open source. It's the de facto standard for orchestrating containers.
These projects didn't survive through philanthropy. They became this widespread precisely because they're open source.
Here's the mechanism: you release the software for free. You build a community of people who use it, who find bugs, who suggest improvements, who contribute code. When your tool becomes essential to thousands of companies, those companies need enterprise support, consulting, customizations, training.
Red Hat built a multi-billion dollar company on Linux. Not by selling Linux (which is free), but by selling services around Linux.
It's not a new model. It's just less immediate to understand compared to "I make software and sell it."
Community-Driven, Not Trend-Driven
There's another important difference. When you develop in open source mode, you don't chase the trend of the moment. You develop for the concrete needs of the community using your tool.
This changes everything. Open source projects that really work are those that solve real problems, not those that implement the latest buzzword. They're tools that change how people work, not features that only serve to make commercial demos.
In the AI field, this approach is becoming increasingly relevant. Projects like Meta's Llama are demonstrating that it's possible to develop powerful language models transparently, allowing the community to verify, improve, and raise ethical questions.
Quinck's Choice
For us, doing open source isn't ideology. It's pragmatism.
We want to build software that lasts. That's verifiable. That solves real problems and not just the ones we imagine. And we want to do it together with people who share these goals.
This doesn't mean everything we do is open source. But when it makes sense to release something publicly, we do it. Because a well-executed open source project brings you feedback you'd never get otherwise. It brings you contributors. It brings you visibility. And in the long run, it also brings you business.
In Practice
If you're evaluating whether to adopt an open source model for your next project, ask yourself:
Does your software solve a problem that many people have?
Could you benefit from external contributions?
Is transparency a value for your users?
Can you build services around the base software?
If the answer is yes to two or more of these questions, open source might be the right path. Not because it's "the right thing to do," but because it's the strategy that works best.