Several European associations that promote Open Source Software (OSS) have joined together to create a European free software professional association, APELL - Association Professionnelle Européenne du Logiciel Libre.

APELL was announced publicly in Brussels, Belgium, the day before FOSDEM - Free and Open Source Software Developers ’Meeting, the largest OSS conference in Europe. It has three founding members (associations from France, Germany and Finland), and also had the participation of several other business associations from several countries, including ESOP representing Portugal.

Aims to give a voice to European OSS companies and to awaken European legislators to the growing importance of the sector. For Stéfane Fermigier, co-president of CNLL and founding member of APELL, it is imperative that "the Commission and the other European institutions recognize that their actions, plans and policies to support Open Source must focus on supporting SMEs", since in Europe this sector is made up mainly of small and medium-sized companies.

Presents itself as "a new essential intermediary between national organizations representing Open Source and EU institutions" that "aims to strengthen cooperation between European companies in the Open Source sector".