Programmes
The Foundation's organised activities, as distinct from the things it publishes — ambassadors, university partnerships, grants and the marketing programmes that support members.
None of these are running yet
All nine are proposed. Nothing on this page is open for applications today, and no programme here has members. They are published because the shape of what the Foundation intends to build is worth showing — but a roadmap presented as a prospectus is the kind of thing that makes everything else harder to believe, so it is said plainly instead.
Community
- Ambassador ProgramPlanned
Recognised contributors who represent EmbeddedOS at events, run local sessions, and carry feedback from their region back to the technical steering committee.
Details - University ProgramPlanned
Course materials, hardware kits and mentoring for universities teaching embedded systems on an open stack rather than a vendor toolchain.
Details - Community MeetupsPlanned
Regular local meetings for people building on EmbeddedOS, organised by ambassadors and supported with materials from the Foundation.
Details
Marketing
- Conference PresencePlanned
A coordinated calendar of talks, booths and workshops at embedded, RTOS and open-source conferences, with a shared CFP pipeline members can join.
Details - Member MarketingPlanned
Blog slots, social amplification and launch support for member organisations, on the model OpenSSF and RISC-V run for their members.
Details - Partner MarketingPlanned
Joint announcements and co-authored material with silicon vendors and integrators shipping EmbeddedOS in their products.
Details
Research
- University CollaborationsPlanned
Formal research partnerships with academic groups, publishing jointly and contributing results back into the platform.
Details - Industry CollaborationsPlanned
Applied research with companies deploying EmbeddedOS, on problems too large for one organisation and too specific for a standards body.
Details - Research GrantsPlanned
Funding for independent work on the embedded stack — security analysis, formal verification, hardware bring-up — awarded on published criteria.
Details
About programmes
What a programme is here
A programme is an organised activity: something people join, attend, apply to, or do together. That is the distinction this page draws. The things the Foundation publishes — articles, videos, datasets, releases — live under Resources and Research. The things it organises — ambassadors, university partnerships, grants, meetups — live here.
The distinction matters because the two kinds of work make different promises. A publication promises that something is true or useful. A programme promises that something will happen, with people, on a schedule. This page lists the second kind, and it is honest about which of them are real yet.
The three tracks
The nine programmes fall into three tracks, matching the parts of the Foundation that would run them. Community covers the people side: the Ambassador Program, the University Program, and Community Meetups — the ways individuals gather around the work.
Marketing covers presence: Conference Presence, Member Marketing, and Partner Marketing — the talks, booths, announcements, and amplification that carry the work outward. Research covers collaboration: University Collaborations, Industry Collaborations, and Research Grants — the formal partnerships and funding through which new work gets done.
What “Planned” means
Every programme on this page currently carries the Planned status, which means exactly what it says: the Foundation intends to run it, has described what it would be, and has not started it. No applications are open, no cohorts exist, and no dates are set.
They are published anyway, for the reason stated at the top of this page: the shape of what the Foundation intends to build is worth showing. When a programme moves from planned to open, this page will say so, and the programme will get a detail page with the terms, the timeline, and how to take part. Until then, “Planned” is the whole story, and we would rather you read that than wonder.
How programmes serve the mission
The Foundation exists to advance open-source embedded systems research, education, and technology for the public benefit. The programmes are how that mission reaches people directly: the University Program and the research grants carry the education and research purposes; the community track carries the stewardship of the ecosystem; the marketing track makes sure the work is found by the people it is for.
None of this is separate from the software. The programmes exist because open-source research does not sustain itself on code alone — it needs people who can teach it, meet about it, fund it, and carry it into new organisations.
Helping start one
Programmes will start when there are people to run them and a community to serve. If you want to help start one — as an ambassador, a university partner, a meetup organiser, or a funder — the contact form linked on this page reaches the Foundation directly.
There is no application process yet because there is nothing to apply to. When that changes, the change will be announced on the News page and reflected here the same day.