CodePlex Foundation announces board of directors

The CodePlex Foundation has announced the members of the board of directors for the Microsoft backed organisation dedicated to promoting open source. Remaining on the board from the interim board which has been in place since the organisation's launch are Sam Ramji, formerly Microsoft's Open Source advocate and now vice-president of Sonoa Systems, and Stephanie Davies Boesch, Microsoft's Director of Programme Management for the .NET framework. They are joined by Jim Jagielski, Chief Architect at VMWare's SpringSource division and chairman of the board of directors at the Apache Software Foundation, and Tony Hey, Microsoft's Corporate Vice President of External Research.

The CodePlex Foundation appointed Paula Hunter as executive director at the start of February and had planned to complete its initial organisation in mid-January. The Foundation's mission is to promote understanding between commercial software vendors and open source communities.

The CodePlex Foundation's board has shrunk from six to five positions, with Miguel de Icaza, VP at Novell, Shaun Walker of DotNetNuke Corporation and Microsoft's Bill Staples and D. Britton Johnston, all stepping down. All four will continue to work with the Foundation as members of its Advisory Board. The fifth seat of the board is being left open while the Foundation continues its search for corporate sponsors.

(djwm)