Case Study: Nuance Communications achieves robust open source compliance and increased customer confidence with Synopsys

A Robust Open Source Compliance Program—The Key to Customer Satisfaction

Nuance, a market leader in conversational AI serving industries from healthcare to automotive, relies heavily on open source software across a 12,000‑person engineering organization. The company faced the challenge of controlling OSS use and license risk while meeting strict customer security and distribution requirements and preserving proprietary code—needs that required company‑wide governance and developer buy‑in.

Nuance implemented a five‑step open source compliance program led by its IP counsel and executed with Synopsys, automating codebase scans with Black Duck, creating policies, and training teams. Outsourcing scans and using Synopsys tools gave visibility and management buy‑in, eased customer concerns, enabled safe contributions back to OSS, preserved proprietary integrations (e.g., Android), reduced ongoing bug fixes, and strengthened secure development practices.

Nuance Communications

Kellen Ponikiewicz

IP Counsel