Profiles: Instantiations, Inc.
and Jive Software

by Linda Barney, Barney and Associates

Two Oregon open-sourced-based companies rate high in Oregon's fastest growing business award
Two Oregon firms are proving that companies creating and selling open source-based software can succeed. Instantiations and Jive Software are number 19 and number 20 respectively on Oregon’s Fastest Growing Businesses list.

Instantiations – build quality software!
Instantiations was founded in 1997 by a team of internationally recognized pioneers in component software technology. The company offers high-ROI professional software development products and services that focus on improving software quality and developer productivity. The company bases its Java programming tools on the popular Eclipse open source technology platform and provides leading-edge software products, services and technologies for Eclipse, Java and Smalltalk. A pioneer in building a profitable business on the open source software model, Instantiations was ranked 19th on the list of Oregon’s Fastest Growing Private Companies for 2007; in 2006, the company ranked 51st. “We’re delighted to be recognized for the second year in a row among this prestigious group,” said Mike Taylor, Instantiations CEO. “And especially so because such recognition will inspire other companies to build profitable businesses based on the open source model.”

In June, 2007, SD Times magazine ranked Instantiations among its top 100 companies influencing software development. Instantiations has four Eclipse-based products for Java developers: WindowBuilder Pro^™, WindowTester Pro^™, RCP Developer^™ and CodePro AnalytiX^™. Thousands of Eclipse developers worldwide use WindowBuilder Pro to quickly create graphical user interfaces (GUIs). WindowTester Pro automates testing of Java GUIs with tools for recording, test generation, code coverage and playback of GUI interactions. RCP Developer leverages the open source Eclipse Rich Client Platform (RCP) for creating Java-based client and standalone desktop applications. A powerful automated software quality tool, CodePro AnalytiX helps developers measure and improve the quality of software as they create it.

Instantiations is actively involved in the Eclipse Foundation and the open source Eclipse software development community. Taylor was on the committee that helped the Eclipse open source community establish a nonprofit foundation in 2003 and was recently re-elected to the Eclipse Foundation board for a second consecutive term. Mark Johnson, Instantiations’ vice president of marketing and business development, previously chaired the Eclipse Public Relations Committee. Members of the Instantiations team have authored books on using Eclipse and volunteer their time on various Eclipse projects. Instantiations gives back to the open source Eclipse community by donating its products to developers who are working on non-commercial open source projects. “We believe open source software – especially Eclipse – provides the most innovative technology and software for developing critical enterprise development tools and software applications, and we’re passionate about building a profitable businesses with it,” said Taylor.

Jive software launches new open source development community at OSCON
Jive Software is a dynamic company in Portland, Oregon that develops online collaboration solutions. Jive products include Openfire (a popular open source collaboration tool) and Clearspace (a Java-based Enterprise 2.0 collaboration tool suite). Dawn Foster (director of developer relations) stated, “These collaboration tools are used by over 1,800 customers worldwide to communicate, share documents, build wikis or blogs, and collaborate on shared documents. Customers include developers as well as customers such as Apple, Oracle, IBM, Citrix, the Harry Potter discussion forum, and Price Waterhouse.”

The company has been in business since 2001 and profitable since inception. In six years, CEO Dave Hersh has led Jive Software from a small open source project to an Inc. 500 company with 100 percent annual growth rates, all without raising any outside investment. The company was founded in New York City but the management team found that New York was expensive and that it was hard to find the kind of development talent Jive needed. Company founders began looking for possible areas to relocate and focused on sites in Colorado, Seattle and Portland. Jive Software CEO Dave Hersh met with Mayor Katz to discuss what Portland had to offer. Matt Tucker (Jive Software’s CTO and co-founder) stated, “Jive Software selected Portland because there is a large pool of technical talent here with the kind of skills we need, it is close to a wide range of outdoor activities, is an incredible place to live and it is easy to recruit workers who want to relocate to Portland.”

During OSCON, Jive Software announced the launch of its new developer community – called Jivespace Developer Community – where developers can collaborate with Jive employees and their peers to write and share plug-ins, themes, macros, and other extensions to Clearspace, Clearspace X and Jive Forums. Collaborative features of Jivespace include discussion forums, wiki documents, sharing of plug-ins, plug-in wish lists, and blogs. Additional developer documentation, tutorials, and video podcasts will also be available in Jivespace. Tucker stated, “Jive Software supports open source any way we can. Our employees use Asterisk, zimbra (email) and Eclipse open source tools. We also participate in the Open Source Open Solutions Alliance, the Portland POSSE user group, and our engineers contribute to OS projects.”

About the author
Linda Barney is the founder and owner of Barney and Associates, a technical and marketing writing firm. Founded in 1990, Barney and Associates specializes in technical writing, documentation, online help, web content and training. Barney and Associates also provides a wide range of marketing writing services including creating media articles, white papers, data sheets, solution briefs, case studies, web content and reviewer’s guides. Contact Linda at linda@barneyassoc.com.