What is OW2

What is OW2?

OW2 is an open source community committed to making available to everyone the best and most reliable middleware and software infrastructure technology, including generic enterprise applications and cloud computing technologies. The mission of the OW2 Consortium is to i) develop open source code for middleware, generic enterprise applications, and cloud computing and ii) to foster a vibrant community and business ecosystem.

History: OW2 was launched on January 1, 2007 as OW2 Consortium through the merger of ObjectWeb and OrientWare, two leading open source middleware consortim consisting of renowned industry IT corporations, innovative start-ups, prominent academic organizations, and individuals from across the world. Orientware was an open organization supported by the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST). In 2007, a new consortium agreement was necessary because the one governing ObjectWeb ended on December 31, 2006. This was the occasion to address some limitations of the previous agreement. For instance, ObjectWeb was not an independent organization, rather it was like a research project launched by its original cofounders, Bull, France Telecom and INRIA, and hosted at INRIA. In this configuration, ObjectWeb lacked resources and was not scalable. The OW2 Consortium overcame these limitations.