Linux Foundation Europe Report Finds Open Source Drives Innovation and Digital Sovereignty, but Strategic Maturity Gaps Persist

New research identifies gaps in leadership, investment and policy engagement as key obstacles to Europe's open source potential

AMSTERDAM, Aug. 25, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Open Source Summit Europe – The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organisation enabling mass innovation through open source, today released the 2025 World of Open Source Europe Report: Open Source as Europe's Strategic Advantage in collaboration with Canonical, LF Europe and LF Research. Based on insights from more than 300 European IT leaders, the report reveals that, while open source is widely adopted and essential to digital sovereignty, a lack of cohesive strategy, leadership commitment, and policy alignment threaten Europe's long-term ability to lead in open innovation.

"With evolving European policies and regulations, open source communities and ecosystems face a critical moment of transformation," said Gabriele Columbro, general manager of Linux Foundation Europe. "The 2025 World of Open Source Europe report reaffirms that European public and private sectors overwhelmingly recognise the value of open source – not only as a vehicle for innovation and vendor independence, but as a foundation for digital sovereignty and economic opportunity. However, without matching strategic investment, C-level commitment and an entrepreneurial friendly climate, Europe risks missing the opportunity to leverage the global digital commons as the most powerful tool to achieve digital autonomy and compete in the global technology landscape."

European Organisations Turn to Open Source to Boost Competitiveness and Collaboration
Open source adoption is widespread across Europe, with the highest adoption in operating systems (64%), followed by cloud and container technologies (55%), web and application development (54%), and AI and machine learning (41%). As more than 90% of organisations find sustained or increased value from open source software (OSS), they must focus on operational excellence, rather than just technology adoption, to gain a competitive advantage.

The report found:

• 75% of respondents believe that OSS development leads to higher quality software
• 69% say engagement with OSS makes their organisation more competitive
• 63% of respondents find higher productivity is the top benefit of utilising OSS, followed by reduced vendor lock-in (62%) and lower cost of software ownership (58%)
• 56% recognise that the benefits of OSS exceed the costs, and looking to the future, 58% say that innovation will benefit most from OSS investment
• 38% prioritise investment in OSS for AI and machine learning to support and scale Europe's vibrant open source AI ecosystem

Open Source as a Pillar of Digital Sovereignty in Europe
The changing geopolitical landscape has fundamentally reshaped how European governments view OSS, elevating it from a technical consideration to a strategic lever for digital sovereignty. Experts are even calling for the creation of an EU-level Sovereign Tech Agency that would fund the maintenance of critical OSS. Updates to the Cyber Resiliency Act (CRA) and the AI Act, which helped mitigate an unmanageable burden on OSS developers, demonstrate the value of advocacy on policy and innovation, and the same proactivity must be implemented to enable digital sovereignty via OSS.

The report found:

• 52% of respondents claim OSS adoption by the government should be a top investment area
• 54% believe OSS investment will most benefit industry standards and interoperability development, mitigating vendor lock-in and enhancing flexibility
• Experts agree that OSS innovation defies boundaries, and European governments should encourage OSS development in Europe, while recognising that Europe benefits from global contributions and collaborations

"The benefits of open source include standardisation, collaborative and community-driven innovation, cost-effectiveness, faster time to market via accelerated deployment, and it also provides an answer to the geopolitical challenges that we are facing," said Philippe Ensarguet, vice president of engineering at Orange and board member at Linux Foundation Europe. "If you rely on specific vendors, you could be at risk and one way to mitigate this is to focus on open source."

Strategic Gaps Weaken Europe's Open Source Advantage
While businesses and governments have much to gain from OSS, many organisations in Europe still approach it in an ad hoc manner, missing opportunities for strategic engagement and success, and falling behind the global benchmark.

The report found:

• Despite the benefits, only 34% of European organisations maintain formal OSS strategies, and only 22% have established OSPOs, compared to 37% and 28% of global organisations, respectively
• Fewer C-level executives (62%) recognise the value of open source to their organisation's future compared to non-C-level employees (86%), who implement OSS to drive innovation
• Only 28% of organisations employ full-time OSS contributors to the projects they depend on, yet 81% of those organisations see high value in such investments

"The responses in the survey clearly show that Europe's open source ecosystem is rich with talent and technical adoption, but it is still maturing in strategic engagement," said Hilary Carter, senior vice president of research at the Linux Foundation. "Europe's technological leadership and sustained innovation depend on closing this maturity gap with intentional, well-resourced action and top-down support for open source software."

Explore the full 2025 World of Open Source Europe Report at linuxfoundation.org/research/world-of-open-source-eu-2025. For research on the state of CRA readiness and compliance in open source, see here.

To learn more about the Linux Foundation, please visit linuxfoundation.org.

About Linux Foundation Research
Founded in 2021, Linux Foundation Research explores the growing scale of open source collaboration, providing insight into emerging technology trends, best practices, and the global impact of open source projects. By leveraging project databases and networks and committing to best practices in quantitative and qualitative methodologies, Linux Foundation Research is creating the go-to library for open source insights for the benefit of organisations worldwide.

About the Linux Foundation
The Linux Foundation is the world's leading home for collaboration on open source software, hardware, standards, and data. Linux Foundation projects are critical to the world's infrastructure including Linux, Kubernetes, Node.js, ONAP, OpenChain, OpenSSF, OpenStack, PyTorch, RISC-V, SPDX, Zephyr, and more. The Linux Foundation is focused on leveraging best practices and addressing the needs of contributors, users, and solution providers to create sustainable models for open collaboration. For more information, please visit us at linuxfoundation.org.

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