Vaadin develops software on an open source basis

The Turku-based software company Vaadin Ltd is a rather different sort of business within its field.  Basing its production on open source code, Vaadin makes use of a global network of users in developing its products. In practice, open source code means that the results of the company’s web program production work is in the public domain and available for adaptation by anyone interested.

– Making use of the user community in our business model is actually quite simple, explains Vaadin Ltd’s Managing Director Joonas Lehtinen.

– If you give people something free, you also get something back. From the user community we get the sort of contacts and the level of help that a company our size would not necessarily otherwise get. This co-operation also bears fruit in the longer term as many of our customers first got to hear of us through the user community, Mr Lehtinen continues.

Vaadin Ltd’s primary product is the Vaadin software framework onto which the actual programs and web applications are built. Vaadin Ltd’s framework is used, for example, in various intranet applications. The end-user is not necessarily aware of the company’s footprint even though the functionality of the framework has a major impact on the usability of the web service, for example.

– We have been developing web software for ten years already. Last year’s launch of the Vaadin framework has triggered tremendous demand, which is beginning to show in our turnover. The growth of the user community has also been rapid, increasing by around 400% in a year, which also bodes well for the future, Mr Lehtinen concludes.

Our summer series introduces interesting and innovative companies from all over Finland.

www.vaadin.com