FOSS4G-BE 2016 Call for Sponsors

FOSS4G Belgium 2016
After different successful events, such as OSGeo Ghent (2013), beOpenGIS (2014) and the geospatial devroom at FOSDEM (2015), the Dutch speaking and French speaking Open GIS communities in Belgium have decided to join their forces in a Belgian chapter of the OSGEO foundation and to organise the first FOSS4G Belgium.

FOSS4G conferences gather developers and users of Open Source geospatial software as well as managers and decision-makers from around the world to discuss new directions, exciting implementations, and growing business opportunities in this domain. Recent years have seen substantial changes in the geospatial industry. One of those changes has been the growth in maturity and adoption of Free and Open Source solutions. In many cases organizations are using a mixture of open and closed source solutions.

We are looking for sponsors who want to support this event.

Target Audience and Structure of the Event
The goal of the conference is to target a broad audience of at least 150 participants.

There will be plenary sessions with a high-level keynote speaker (tbd), a main track with presentations of use cases, one side track targeting IT-officers and covering the practicalities of the use of FOSS4G in institutional settings, and a second side track targeting developers of FOSS4G.

Presentations and debates with be both in English and in the major official languages of Belgium: Dutch and French.

See the event web page for more information.

Date and Venue
The event will take place on September 22, 2016 in the beautiful new conference facilities of the [http://www.environnement.brussels/ Environment and Energy Agency] of the Brussels Capital Region which supports the event by providing the location.

Sponsorship Levels and Benefits
The following table lists the lower limits of different sponsoring levels and the corresponding benefits sponsors get at the event for their support:

Contact
If you are interested in sponsoring FOSS4G-BE then please contact XXX.

OSGeo
The Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo), is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to support the collaborative development of open source geospatial software, and promote its widespread use. The foundation provides financial, organizational and legal support to the broader open source geospatial community. It also serves as an independent legal entity to which community members can contribute code, funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge that their contributions will be maintained for public benefit. OSGeo also serves as an outreach and advocacy organization for the open source geospatial community, and provides a common forum and shared infrastructure for improving cross-project collaboration.

The foundation's projects are all freely available and useable under an OSI-certified open source license.

Why Sponsor OSGeo

 * Your Organization Depends on OSGeo Software - Your company or government agency uses OSGeo technologies in its day-to-day work, allowing you to compete effectively and deliver services in an efficient manner. By helping sustain OSGeo you also support your current operations into the future knowing that a strong OSGeo is behind your business activities.
 * You represent a Community of Practice that has Adopted OSGeo Software - Communities representing a wide range of domains, from professional associations to non-government organizations, leverage OSGeo software as a critical component of their end-user applications. Your community has an interest in ensuring the software can be sustained into the future. By sponsoring OSGeo you demonstrate support for your members' software selection.
 * Your Goals are aligned with OSGeo's Support for Open Standards and Other Priorities - Help achieve your own organization's objectives by sponsoring OSGeo as a like-minded organization and benefit from the volunteer efforts of a rapidly growing world-wide community.
 * Demonstrate Your Leadership in Open Source Geospatial Technologies - By sponsoring OSGeo you will help align your business with the activities of thousands of adopters of OSGeo software around the world. As a sponsor of OSGeo, you will align your business growth with the momentum behind OSGeo in the marketplace.
 * Benefit from Sponsor Networking Opportunities - As a sponsor of OSGeo, you will benefit from unique opportunities to meet and share ideas with key members of OSGeo, other OSGeo sponsors and affiliated like-minded individuals and organizations.

OSGeo-BE
The upcoming Belgian chapter aims at translating the general OSGeo missions to the Belgian context by organising networking and information events.