I’m incredibly chuffed to announce that as of today, we’ve opened a subsidiary company Cambridge, UK. This has been a while in the making, and is a huge step for us. We consider this step to be the optimal solution to the growing and changing demands on our business:

• Our customer base in the UK is growing. We’ve always operated internationally, but after the Netherlands, the UK has been the place we have been most active in. By opening an office here, we will be able to serve local demands much, much better.
• Requests for development consultancy have been growing. While we primarily offer quality assurance services, our skillset includes specialization in mobile software development, high scalability server architecture and process consulting, and increasingly customers have asked for our help in these areas. By starting a new business unit dedicated to these services, we’re improving our focus, and will be able to pursue these activities with the dedication they deserve.
• Synergy is not just a buzzword. When we previously spoke to customers about QA or development services, we did so in isolation, because we were thinking of ourselves as “a QA company that can do development”. Ironically, by giving full credit to each part separately, we’re in a much better position to offer the combined package to our customers.

You can reach the Cambridge office straight away on +44 (0) 1223 853863, or send an email to development@spritecloud.com. Our office/postal address is:

spriteCloud Ltd.
ideaSpace/Entrepreneurship Centre
3 Charles Babbage Road
Cambridge
CB3 0GT
United Kingdom

Some of us will be at this year’s FOSDEM conference, and we figured that’d be a great moment to run a witch hunt^W^Wcontest.

The rules are simple:

1. Spot any of us at FOSDEM, and take a picture as proof. For the purposes of this competition, the whole of Brussels counts as “at FOSDEM”, at least from 02/02/2012 to 05/02/2012 (CET timezone).
2. Send the image to fosdem@spritecloud.com. No entries arriving past the 29th of February 2012 will be accepted (CET timezone). Please include your name, email address, and whether or not you want either of them published. We reserve the right to publish your image submission anonymously, though.
3. We’ll judge which pictures are best. Bonus points if you include yourself, make it funny, or manage to connect it to a particular FOSS project, etc. Offensive submissions will be disqualified. We’re impervious to bribery, but we may take whatever freebies you offer anyway.
4. The three best entries get a guest blog post here, on any subject related to FOSS and/or testing or writing software. It goes without saying, really, but offensive content will be rejected even if it’s relevant.
5. The best entry also gets a free T-shirt.

We’d love to give away more swag, but we’re unprepared – this whole thing has been somewhat spontaneous. If it’s a success, we’ll do it again next year, but bigger. So be sure to participate!

P.S.: Here’s the boring legalese:

1. The contest is open to anyone except employees and the families of employees of spriteCloud B.V. By entering this contest, contestants agree that spriteCloud B.V. may use all images created for the contest for promotional purposes.
2. All entries and all rights relating there become property of spriteCloud B.V.
3. By entering, all entrants agree to release spriteCloud B.V. and their employees from all liability and claims relating to participation in the contest. No substitutions or transfer of prizes or cash redemptions permitted by winners.
4. spriteCloud B.V. reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to cancel, suspend or alter the rules & parameters of the contest. spriteCloud B.V. also reserves the right to substitute a prize or prizes as it deems suitable in the event that the prize is unavailable for any reason whatsoever.
5. Winners under the age of 18 (as of win announcement) must have their parents’ and/or legal guardians’ consent to accept prizes. Winners, by acceptance of prizes, agree to release spriteCloud B.V. from any and all liability claims or actions of any kind whatsoever for damages.
6. Offer void where prohibited, regulated or restricted by law in a manner inconsistent with the purposes and rules hereof.