Odoo is a suite of business management software tools including, for example, CRM, e-commerce, billing, accounting, manufacturing, warehouse, project management, and inventory management. During Odoo experience which took place in Belgium in October 2022, Fabien Pinckaers announced that moving forward Odoo will make all applications available for free in enterprise edition, making Odoo an unparalleled suite of +70 integrated business apps. The Community version is a

libre software Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, no ...

, licensed under the GNU LGPLv3. The Enterprise version has proprietary extra features and services. The

source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a program is specially designed to facilitate the wo ...

for the framework and core ERP modules is curated by the Belgium-based Odoo S.A. Odoo is available for both on-premises and ready to use SaaS environment. The source code for the OpenObject framework and the core ERP modules are provided by Belgium-based Odoo S.A.

Overview

From inception, Odoo S.A (formerly OpenERP S.A) has released the core software as open source. Since the V9.0 release, the company has transitioned to an

open core The open-core model is a business model for the monetization of commercially produced open-source software. Coined by Andrew Lampitt in 2008, the open-core model primarily involves offering a "core" or feature-limited version of a software pro ...

model, which provides subscription-based proprietary

enterprise software Enterprise software, also known as enterprise application software (EAS), is computer software used to satisfy the needs of an organization rather than individual users. Such organizations include businesses, schools, interest-based user groups, ...

and cloud-hosted

software as a service Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is con ...

, in addition to the open source version. In 2013, the not-for-profit Odoo Community Association was formed to promote the widespread use of Odoo and to support the collaborative development of Odoo features. Odoo's extensible architecture allows a large number of freelancers and organizations to develop Odoo Apps or Modules and place them in the marketplace for sale or to be downloaded for free. The main Odoo components are the framework, about 30 core applications (also called official modules), and thousands of community modules. Odoo has been used as a component of university courses. A study on experimental learning suggested that Odoo (then known as OpenERP) provides a suitable alternative to proprietary systems to supplement teaching. Several books have been written about Odoo, some covering specific areas such as accounting or development.

Version support

The last three Long Term Support versions (LTS) are supported in parallel. This means that when a new, fourth LTS version is released, the oldest version will reach the end of its useful life and will no longer be supported. As an example, 9.0 LTS is supported along with 10.0 LTS and 11.0 LTS, but it will reach End of Life when 12.0 LTS is released.

History

In 2005, Fabien Pinckaers, the founder and current

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

of Odoo, started to develop his first software product, TinyERP. Three years later, the name was changed to OpenERP. The company started to grow quickly and in 2010, OpenERP had become a 100+ employee company. In 2013, the company won a Deloitte award for being the fastest-growing company in Belgium, with 1549% growth over a five-year period. In 2014, the company was renamed Odoo, to diversify itself from the term "ERP". In 2015, Inc. Magazine placed Odoo in the top 5000 fastest-growing private companies in Europe. In 2019, the company raised a $90 million investment. In 2021, Odoo products were used by more than 5 million customers. Odoo expects to hire 1,000 new employees, according to CEO Fabien Pinckaers.

Reception

Odoo has received several recognitions; before its name change, it received awards as OpenERP including Trends Gazelle, Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Award and the

InfoWorld ''InfoWorld'' (abbreviated IW) is an information technology media business. Founded in 1978, it began as a monthly magazine. In 2007, it transitioned to a web-only publication. Its parent company today is International Data Group, and its siste ...

's BOSSIE Award 2013. After changing its name to Odoo, it won consecutive BOSSIE Awards in 2014, 2015, and 2016.

References

External links