SUSE Partners with Collabora to Deliver Commercial LibreOffice Support

September 3, 2013


Partnership ensures continuity for enterprise customers and open source community

NUREMBERG, Germany, and CAMBRIDGE, U.K.

SUSE and Collabora Productivity (“Collabora”) today announced a partnership to deliver maintenance and support to SUSE's LibreOffice customers. Under terms of the agreement, Collabora will begin supporting commercial versions of LibreOffice – a comprehensive, professional-quality productivity suite – ensuring continuity of support for enterprise customers and open source LibreOffice development.

SUSE customers with active LibreOffice subscriptions will continue to receive maintenance and support from SUSE until their subscriptions expire. New LibreOffice customers, as well as SUSE customers who renew their LibreOffice subscriptions, may elect to receive maintenance and support directly from Collabora.

“In transitioning LibreOffice support to Collabora, SUSE is ensuring continuity of excellent support for its customers and providing for ongoing investment from Collabora into LibreOffice,” said Nils Brauckmann, president and general manager of SUSE. “This transition will allow SUSE to focus on our core Linux and cloud infrastructure businesses, while helping LibreOffice continue its trajectory of growth and usefulness.”

LibreOffice is a community-driven project of the not-for-profit organization The Document Foundation. In addition to providing commercial support for LibreOffice, Collabora is joining The Document Foundation's advisory board alongside SUSE and will assume a more active role in the project.

Philippe Kalaf, CEO of Collabora, said, "Collabora believes Free Software holds great promise in the office suite market, and we look forward to providing supported LibreOffice releases across Windows, Mac and Linux to both existing and new LibreOffice customers worldwide. We will naturally extend our proven consultancy portfolio to include feature development for LibreOffice."

To ensure continuity of service to enterprise customers and to help with ongoing community support for the LibreOffice project, key SUSE developers working on LibreOffice are joining Collabora, forming its new Productivity division. For more information on Collabora's LibreOffice support, including pricing, visit https://libreoffice-from-collabora.com/.

“As a strong supporter from the very first day, SUSE has contributed so much to get LibreOffice standing on its own feet,” said Florian Effenberger, chairman of the board of The Document Foundation. “We are truly grateful for all they have contributed, and we are excited to have Collabora join our advisory board and see what great heights the team will reach in the future.”

About Collabora

Collabora is a global software consultancy specializing in delivering the benefits of open source to the commercial world. Collabora combines years of open source software expertise with hard-won experience from working in the mobile, automotive and consumer electronics industries. They help clients effectively integrate open source technologies into consumer and enterprise products, re-using existing components to reduce time to market and focusing on product differentiation.

About SUSE

SUSE, a pioneer in open source software, provides reliable, interoperable Linux and cloud infrastructure solutions that give enterprises greater control and flexibility. More than 20 years of engineering excellence, exceptional service and an unrivaled partner ecosystem power the products and support that help our customers manage complexity, reduce cost, and confidently deliver mission-critical services. The lasting relationships we build allow us to adapt and deliver the smarter innovation they need to succeed – today and tomorrow. For more information, visit suse.com.