Open source · Leadership · Mountains

Small ideas grow.
Keep seeding.

From a student project to an app more than half a million people use every month. I start things, then make room for great people to take them further.

CEO, OPENGIS.ch Chair, QGIS.org Creator, QField
A little more about me

Laax · Swiss Alps

01 A small beginning

A small project.
Three missing credits.

QField started as a student project, when I was three credits short of my master’s degree in geography. I built the first versions on my own and then spent the next fifteen years finding people who could make it better than I ever could alone.

The same pattern runs through everything I have started. OPENGIS.ch began with one person and is now almost fifty. 27summits began over a glass of Merlot in a hut. None of it grew by accident. It grew because the right people came in and got the room to make it theirs.

I like starting things.
I like even more what happens when the right people take them further than I could.

Have an idea to grow together?
2M+QField downloads
500k+monthly QField users
~50people at OPENGIS.ch
2011the year it all started
02 Work that grows

Every tree
starts as a seed.

A few of the things I have started or help carry. All of them open source.

01 / THE FIELD

QField

I started QField in 2011 as a Google Summer of Code project, porting QGIS to Android on my own. Today a team at OPENGIS.ch builds it with a worldwide community, for the people who collect and work with data outside.

Explore QField 02 / THE TEAM

OPENGIS.ch

The company Matthias Kuhn and I founded. Almost fifty people working on QGIS, QField, QFieldCloud and Georama, and the second biggest contributor to QGIS core.

Meet the team 03 / THE COMMUNITY

QGIS

I have chaired QGIS.org since 2020, after two years as vice-chair. The most used open-source GIS in the world, built and governed by a community of thousands.

Discover QGIS 04 / NOTES FROM THE WORK

Open by nature

What we learn building open-source geospatial software, written by the team at OPENGIS.ch.

Read the OPENGIS.ch blog
03 Leading

Make room
for great people.

Good things grow when the people around them have space to grow too.

I lead a team of almost fifty at OPENGIS.ch, chair QGIS.org, a community of thousands of contributors and millions of users, and sit on the board of OSGeo. In all three places the job is much the same: listen first, look for the road everyone can walk on, and bring people with different views to the same table.

My favourite part is watching people take over things I used to do, and do them better. A team that can replace its boss is a healthy team, and it leaves me time to plant the next seed.

~50people at OPENGIS.ch, from one in 2011
2020chair of QGIS.org, after two years as vice-chair
2022on the OSGeo board of directors
420at the QGIS User Conference I organised in Laax
04 Stories from the stage

A few things
worth sharing.

I speak about open source as a business, about the people behind the software, and about what the mountains teach you about both. In English, German, Italian, French or Spanish, wherever the conference is.

COMING 2027

From the lowest point

27 summits, open source and what a normal person can do when the legs say stop and the head says keep going.

↗
COMING 2027

Make room for great people

Leadership as making room for others, and why it’s a pleasure when your team grows into your job and beyond.

↗
Book me for a keynote
05 Outside the office

Every summit starts
at the lowest point.

I’ve reached the highest point of 26 Swiss cantons, starting from each canton’s lowest point and getting there under my own power. One summit to go.

In the mountains as in open source, I start small and go step by step. Ski touring, climbing or flying, mostly with friends. With two small kids at home, the big days are rarer and the short ones count double.

Follow the 27summits journey
06 A little context

The longer
version.

Short CV Software CV Sports CV

I am a geographer who ended up writing software, and an entrepreneur who ended up chairing a foundation. Both happened the same way: I started something small, went looking for people better than me, and gave them room.

The small thing was QField. I built the first version in 2011 as a Google Summer of Code project, porting QGIS to Android on my own, because I was a few credits short of my master’s degree and needed a project. Today a team at OPENGIS.ch builds it with a worldwide community, it has passed two million downloads, and more than half a million people use it every month to collect data in the field.

OPENGIS.ch is the company Matthias Kuhn and I founded. We are almost fifty people working on QGIS, QField, QFieldCloud and Georama, and the second biggest contributor to QGIS core. Since 2020 I have chaired QGIS.org, since 2022 I have sat on the board of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation.

I live in Laax, in a small Romansh-speaking village in the Swiss Alps, with my partner and our two kids. I speak Italian, German, French, English and Spanish, and I speak about open source as a business wherever a conference will have me. When I am not working, I am in the mountains: ski touring, climbing or flying, and slowly finishing 27summits, which has one summit left.

Based in Laax, Switzerland · Italian, German, French, English, Spanish & Romansh

07 The next good thing

Have a seed
to plant?

For a keynote, an open-source project, or a chat after a long day in the mountains, I’m happy to hear from you.

marco@berna.io