# Partnership Strategy Brainstorming

###### tags: `Parternships` `Brainstorming`

## Software royalty partnerships with open source contributors

### Overview

One way we plan to compete with proprietary software goliaths asymmetrically is by offering open-source software developers the opportunity to build equity with our products, and earn passive royalty income as the app generates revenue.

These products will be a part of Grey software's app collection, which means they will have versions with exclusive features for sponsors.

By sponsoring Grey Software on Github, people can access exclusive features within the apps in our collection.

When we have a profitable month, we will distribute the profit to the open-source developers who gave their time and energy to build the products that helped generate revenue for the organization.

### Why is this a valuable idea?

The world needs to reward open source contributors for the work they do.

At the moment, many open source organizations can't pay their open source contributors a living wage.

This model allows organizations to offer open source contributors an alternative means of building wealth.

### Example scenario

Grey Software wants to launch a web extension that allows people to hide distracting elements on LinkedIn and Twitter So they can focus on meaningful work instead of being forced to consume the drama of the day.

Grey Software contracts designer Raj Paul and engineer Avi Davé to help build and publish the extension.

With the help of public building tools such as GitLab, HackMD, and Figma, the project lead Arsala can visualize and contextualize each contributor's time and energy expenditure into the extension.

When the extension is launched and generates profitable revenue, Raj, Avi, and Arsala will generate passive royalty income.

### FAQ

**Is there an implementation of this idea elsewhere so that we can learn from the successes and failures of others?**

**What are some possible algorithms we can use to ensure a fair distribution of software royalties?**

## Collaborating with open source organizations on GSC apps

### Overview

One way we plan to compete with proprietary software goliaths asymmetrically is by creating open-source products with other organizations in the space.

Organizations will collaborate based on a contract that outlines how each organization will contribute to the software and how much equity each organization will have.

When the software product generates revenue, the organization hosting the financial pipeline will distribute the revenue to the other organizations involved, proportional to their equity.

### Why is this a valuable idea?

Building functioning open-source software products is complex, and it is valuable for software organizations in the space to have shared infrastructure and human capacity.

By adding collaboratively developed software products to the Grey software app collection, the value of the deal for people increases. We can thus attract more sponsors and generate more revenue.

### Example scenario

Grey Software, Cato, and BeyondExams have a similar idea for an open-source software product that allows people to learn from YouTube by going through community curated courses with notes and questions.

These three organizations enter a joint software venture to build a new and improved app on top of the core BeyondExams infrastructure. This new app will be a part of the Grey software app collection and will have a subset of features exclusively for Grey Software's Github sponsors.

Because Grey software offers this new product alongside Focused Browsing, Modfy Video, and the promise of future software that humans can trust, love, and learn from, the chances of a person paying for access to exclusive features increases.

### FAQ

**Is there an implementation of this idea elsewhere so that we can learn from the successes and failures of others?**

**What are some possible algorithms we can use to ensure a fair distribution of the revenue generated by the software to the organizations involved?**