ONF announced a startup membership category at the beginning of 2014. Six months and 24 companies later, we couldn’t be happier with our decision.
ONF is based in Silicon Valley; we work and live in a startup hub, so the startup mentality is deeply engrained in our organization. We recognize and support the value that these companies bring to their respective industries. But we also know that there are challenges associated with being a startup, and the cost of joining ONF may have previously been outside the scope of some startups’ budgets.
Encouraging contributions from the wide spectrum of SDN organizations accelerates the adoption of open SDN, so earlier this year we created our startup membership category in order to help drive more open SDN innovation for the benefit of end users. Thus, we offer full membership benefits at only $1,000 per year for the first two years of a company’s incorporation.
We are building upon that announcement today with the exciting news that we’ve gained 24 new startup member companies in the past six months. That’s nearly 20 percent of our current membership! And of particular note, these companies come from all over the globe, from Canada to Australia and Korea to Ireland. It is clear that this category has enabled more startup companies to join ONF, and we’re thankful for their participation within the organization and the open SDN movement as a whole.
Over the next few weeks, we will publish several blog posts written by our startup member companies, describing their places within the industry, the role of ONF, and the doors that the startup membership category has opened for them.
This is an exciting time for the networking industry. We can’t wait for the advancements that will come about through the work of these companies, and the urgency they place on our more established members.
- Dan Pitt, Executive Director
