Over the last decades, Open Source Software (OSS) has become increasingly popular and moved into the mainstream software industry. Our project\u27s goal is to investigate the need for an Open Source Institute (OSI) within Simon Fraser University (SFU). We performed a literature review and interviewed IT specialists from various local companies. We identified some barriers to the adoption of OSS, including lack of working knowledge of OSS, lack of multi-tier technical support, and legal concerns. Our analysis confirmed the need for this institute to promote OSS. We recommend that the SFU-OSI should broker technical support for OSS, to increase the level of awareness by organizing events and incubator-type initiatives, to offer various levels of training, to create standards and frameworks for user-friendly and well-documented OSS, to mine the undocumented innovations embedded in mature OSS, and to work with governments to leverage OSS for the betterment of society
