The University of California Open Summit (UC Open) 2025 was held on April 23–24 at the UCSC Silicon Valley Campus in Santa Clara. This was the first major event organized by the University of California Open Source Program Office (UC OSPO) Network. The summit – which welcomed about 125 participants – provided a unique opportunity to illustrate the value of open source within the UC system and its broader impact on the wider open source community. The UC Open Source Summit included keynotes, panels, directed discussions and technical sessions that covered a wide range of topics and brought together UC researchers, faculty, students and staff, as well as industry and open source communities interested in collaborating in open source. By bringing together a diverse community of contributors, the summit fostered meaningful discussions, collaborations, and a shared vision for the future of open source within the University of California system and beyond. This inaugural event further revealed an energetic, ambitious vision shared among researchers, staff, and industry professionals that greater university engagement with, and support for, open source projects can be a cornerstone of expanded innovation.
Highlights from Day One¶
Academic Contributions to Open Source: A panel moderated by Stephanie Lieggi (UC Santa Cruz) highlighted the diverse journeys of open source professionals, each shaped by a combination of support, serendipity, and vision, with insights from panelists Fernando Perez (UC Berkeley and Jupyter), Bin Fan (Alluxio), and Tony Wasserman (Software Methods & Tools, formerly of CMU and UC San Francisco).
Commercial Open Source Models: A fireside chat with Heather Meeker (Tech Law Partners LLP) and James Davis (UC Santa Cruz) delved into how innovators can profit by giving software away. Meeker believes that open source is a strength, not a weakness, for a business, expanding a product’s reach and building trust in one’s brand.
A Data-based Approach to Building Inclusive Open Source Communities: Kenyatta Forbes shared insights from GitHub’s recent Open Source Survey, which explored how academic institutions can shape the future of a more inclusive, sustainable open source ecosystem. The survey notably revealed that much progress remains to be made in improving diversity and belonging in open source. Nevertheless, Forbes pointed to several remedies that projects have implemented and that resulted in tangible improvements.
Understanding the Wicked Problem of Working in the Open: VM (Vicky) Brasseur addressed the complexities of collaboration in open source projects, highlighting common pitfalls and strategies to overcome them. In this presentation, Brasseur characterized collaboration in open source as a “wicked problem”--a term from the social sciences for a problem without a solution. Despite this, argued Brasseur, we can make progress through small steps.
Increasing Research Impact through Open Source and Technology Transfer: A panel moderated by Karla Padilla (UC San Diego), featuring panelists from various UC campuses and the UC Office of the President, discussed how tech transfer offices can support open source creators and contributors through tailored open source licenses and legal recommendations that account for the creator’s goals and principles.
Open Source in Science: Kate Hertweck from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative shared insights from CZI’s Essential Open Source Software for Science program, which has been a major supporter of open science work. In an analysis grounded in survey data, Kate shared the lessons CZI has learned about how to maximize the impact of funding for open source sustainability.
The UC Open made a conscious effort to provide space for meaningful interactions and provided participants ample opportunities to network and have in-depth conversations. To further promote that goal, the first day’s program ended with a lively round of Lightning Intros from almost 30 participants. These intros were an opportunity for anyone attending to say a quick hello ahead of the reception, catalyzing the making of connections between people who may not have had a chance to meet and share experiences.
The second day of the event emphasized practical, community-focused engagement in open source, addressing both technical and institutional challenges. Through interactive panels, technical talks, and directed discussions, attendees explored how UC can lead and innovate in the open source ecosystem, reinforcing the summit’s mission of building a sustainable and inclusive open source culture.
Highlights from Day Two¶
Understanding What is Meant by “Open”: Moderator Kirstie Whitaker (UC Berkeley) talked with UC OSPO Network members Amber Budden (UCSB), Todd Grappone (UCLA) and Jarrod Millman (UC Berkeley), as well as open science expert Kristen Ratan (Strategies for Open Science) about the definition of “open” in the context of research, science, and technology. Panelists and audience members shared diverse perspectives on openness in data sharing, software, and scientific collaboration.
Open Source in Agriculture and the overlap of academia and industry: Moderator Rob Trice (Better Food Ventures) brought together a diverse panel of experts from academia and industry to look at the growing effort to leverage open source tools and data to innovate in food production, supply chains, and sustainability. This was the first of its kind cross-sector discussion on open source and AgriFood.
Understanding Open Source Licensing and Contributions in Academic Settings: Two moderated discussion sessions focused on the impact of licensing on open source projects originating in academia and contributions to outside projects by university staff and researchers. In the first session, moderators Karla Padilla (UC San Diego) and Jeff Shapiro (Linux Foundation) led an interactive discussion that looked at the fundamentals of OSS licenses, including permissive vs. copyleft models and best practices for UC-affiliated developers. In the second, participants talked about common challenges for university staff – particularly in the IT departments – working with open source software, and looked at ways of mitigating barriers to contributing to impactful projects.
Highlighting the UC Network’s work on OSS Sustainability: This session included a directed discussion of open source sustainability and effort to improve the resilience of open source efforts at UC. It included a demo of the Open Source Software PRojEct sustainabilitY tracker (OSSPREY) developed at UC Davis.
AI, Open Source and Industry Collaboration: The Summit had two technical sessions focusing on the impact of AI on academic collaborations. One focused on the vLLM project, which is a successful collaboration between RedHat and UC Berkeley. Another session highlighted the security challenges of the ML supply chain and demonstrated how cryptographic signatures can help users verify that the models they use are exactly those produced by trusted developers.
The summit concluded with a collaborative discussion, led by UC OSPO Network Community Manager Laura Langdon, on the role of OSPOs in fostering open source across UC campuses and identifying strategies to scale their impact. In this session, participants provided valuable feedback into what they wanted to see from OSPOs on their campuses.
Sponsors and Support¶
UC Open 2025 was made possible through the generous support of several sponsors:
🌟 Platinum Sponsors 🌟: Red Hat, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Silver Sponsor: UCSC’s Center for Research in Open Source Software (CROSS)
Bronze Sponsor: GitHub
The event also received significant support from UCSC’s Baskin Engineering, which provided the venue and technical support for the entire event.
Looking to 2026!¶
There will be a UC Open 2026! The UC OSPO Network has tentatively agreed to hold our second summit at one of our Southern California campuses to allow for more participation from campuses, industry and open source communities in that region. Stay tuned for more details on that soon!