Hi,

as I explained in a previous mail, in the past, besides the former Boosters team, there were other SUSE employees working full time in openSUSE with different roles. Now, everybody that works full time in openSUSE is concentrated in a single team, the openSUSE Team at SUSE, that is part of the R&D and Communities department.

The above strategy has also been supported from the financial point of view. The economic decisions from SUSE that directly affects openSUSE have also being moved to this department. This move will take some time to consolidate but it is on its way.

As I also wrote before, we are working at SUSE on our future actions we will execute as company to support the project/community. Some of those actions have to do with the relation we would like to develop with openSUSE from the financial perspective.

We will open a discussion with the Board, through our Chairman, Vincent Untz, about processes to be followed in economic topics. I would like to advance "the framework" in this relevant moment, the Board elections.

Until now, most (almost all) of the decision logic on financial matters was placed over SUSE's shoulders. We will propose some measures to transfer part of that logic step by step into the community. This process will be associated to the following concepts:

* Agreements: we want to go through this process in agreement with the community.

* Transparency: all the processes and decisions have to be done in a transparent way not just toward the community but toward SUSE and other possible sponsors. This mean that budgeting / reporting is a necessary requirement attached to this process.

* Scalability: in order for this process to scale, it is necessary that all the financial procedures within the community have the Board as the final and starting point, so our relation with the community in this matter, in the same way that for other sponsors in the future, is routed through them.

We understand that it is up to the community to define the relation between the Board and those who will have relation or will manage the economic resources, like the Travel Support Program, Ambassadors, Program etc. Until now, this relation has been directly established with SUSE.

We also believe that this relation between Board and executors will be more efficient if it is simple, clear and have trust as an important ingredient.

During the next months we have, at least, the following challenges to face from the financial point of view: * The Travel Support Program 2013 * The new Ambassadors Program * A new model for supporting our action in events * Hackathons

We would like to encourage the new Board to work with us, facing those challenges together. We will propose that this process is complemented with a definition of the relation between the Board and those who are going to execute these actions.

So, in summary, our relation with openSUSE in the financial area, will be routed through the Board step by step, so we all can learn with little pressure and clear direction.

Saludos