Support is tablestakes for B2B so this isn’t unique to OSS
and what you're describing was also debunked as a scalable core business model by many companies...
https://a16z.com/2014/02/14/why-there-will-never-be-another-...
A lot of the software our customers pay us for is _not_ open source but fits in with the open source in a really natural way (and we’re on the frontend/mobile). We also don’t see support standalone, you only get it in tandem with the software subscription.
“Support” is a loaded term. Every B2B company has to have a team able to support their biggest customers and you’d be dumb to not charge extra for it. I don’t think the shape of our support is that much heavier than any B2B SaaS company today and our high gross margins just on support further prove that (but it’s not our core business).
So far the model is scaling. Can it scale to be another public OSS success like red hat or mongo? We’d like to think so but we’ve got a long ways to go still on that.
Is there no difference between technical support and consulting?
I see technical support as answering emails and picking up the phone when someone needs the help using your product.
For instance, AWS Support Plans[1].
that model just doesn't work for me because while it may work financially (and i have seen companies being successful with it), it prevents the product from being fully immersed into the Free Software ecosystem.
to sell commercial licenses i need to own 100% of the code, which means i can't easily accept outside contributions, nor can i use GPLd libraries which would conflict a commercial license. i do not want to be limited in my choice of tools to suit a commercial license. that's not what i think a good Free Software project should be like.
your comment therefore feels like a relief. my question is though, how to get the companies interested when the product is not yet proven? how to start, find the first customers? those who will pay enough for support to allow me to finish building the product?
The big money is in doing those things too and not just being one small piece of the puzzle. So, for us, that means helping teams be successful with app development in general using our software/tech in the process (i.e. scalable software product on a yearly subscription and the same as sold to other customers, not custom development).
If you want to go down that route, get ready to have excellent support and be willing to be seen as an expert that your customers are going to call upon. But support is tablestakes for B2B so that comes with the territory.
Of course, this is no small leap. Going from having a successful open source project to building an enterprise business around it is really hard and took a lot longer than I expected. Looking back I wish we spent a little less time worrying about GitHub stars and more about solving enterprise problems, but we made it through!
Of course this is just one way to monetize and I’m also excited about the growing OSS sustainability offerings out there, like Tidelift