# Zond Entity Contributor License Agreement
**Version 1.0 — 9 August 2026**
This agreement is for **corporations, organisations and other legal entities** whose
employees or agents contribute to Zond ("the Project"), maintained by Erik Lening
("the Maintainer", "we", "us"). Individual contributors acting on their own behalf
should sign the [Individual CLA](CLA.md) instead.
If your employees contribute to the Project as part of their work, your
organisation — not the individual — is likely to own the copyright in that work.
This agreement records your organisation's permission for the Project to use it.
Please complete the schedule at the end, have it signed by someone authorised to
bind your organisation, and send it to **licensing@zond.rs**.
---
## 1. Definitions
**"You"** means the legal entity entering into this agreement, together with all
other entities that control, are controlled by, or are under common control with
that entity. For this purpose, **"control"** means (i) the power, direct or
indirect, to cause the direction or management of such entity, whether by contract
or otherwise, (ii) ownership of fifty percent (50%) or more of the outstanding
shares, or (iii) beneficial ownership of such entity.
**"Contribution"** means any original work of authorship, including any
modification of or addition to an existing work, that is intentionally submitted by
You to the Maintainer for inclusion in or documentation of any of the products
owned or managed by the Maintainer.
**"Submit"** means any form of electronic, verbal or written communication sent to
the Maintainer or its representatives — including but not limited to pull
requests, issues, patches sent by email, and discussion on mailing lists or issue
trackers — for the purpose of discussing and improving the Project. It excludes
communication that is conspicuously marked, in writing, as **"Not a
Contribution"**.
**"Designated Employees"** means the individuals listed in the Schedule below, as
amended by You from time to time by written notice to the Maintainer, who are
authorised to submit Contributions on Your behalf.
---
## 2. Grant of Copyright License
Subject to the terms of this agreement, You hereby grant to the Maintainer, and to
recipients of software distributed by the Maintainer, a perpetual, worldwide,
non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable copyright license to
reproduce, prepare derivative works of, publicly display, publicly perform,
sublicense and distribute Your Contributions and such derivative works.
**This license expressly includes the right to license and sublicense Your
Contribution under terms of the Maintainer's choosing, including proprietary and
commercial terms, and to relicense the Project as a whole under a different
license.** This is what allows the Project to be offered both as free software
under the GNU Affero General Public License and under separate commercial terms.
You retain all right, title and interest in Your Contributions. Nothing in this
agreement transfers ownership of Your copyright, and You remain free to use Your
Contributions for any other purpose whatsoever.
### 2.1 Construction under German copyright law
This agreement is governed by German law, which does not permit the transfer of
copyright itself (§ 29(1) UrhG). The grant above therefore takes effect as the
grant of a **non-exclusive right of use** (*einfaches Nutzungsrecht*) under § 31
UrhG, unlimited in time, territory and content, covering every known type of use.
You expressly consent, for the purposes of **§ 35 UrhG**, to the Maintainer
granting further rights of use in Your Contributions to third parties — including
exclusive rights and rights on proprietary terms — without needing to seek Your
approval in each case.
You represent that You hold the necessary rights of use in Your Designated
Employees' work — whether under § 43 UrhG, under contract, or otherwise — to make
this grant, and that You have secured from each Designated Employee any consent
required for the sublicensing described above.
---
## 3. Grant of Patent License
Subject to the terms of this agreement, You hereby grant to the Maintainer, and to
recipients of software distributed by the Maintainer, a perpetual, worldwide,
non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable (except as stated in this
section) patent license to make, have made, use, offer to sell, sell, import and
otherwise transfer the Contribution, where such license applies only to those
patent claims licensable by You that are necessarily infringed by Your
Contribution alone or by combination of Your Contribution with the Project to
which it was submitted.
If any entity institutes patent litigation against You or any other entity —
including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit — alleging that Your
Contribution, or the Project to which it was submitted, constitutes direct or
contributory patent infringement, then any patent licenses granted to that entity
under this agreement for that Contribution or Project shall terminate as of the
date such litigation is filed.
---
## 4. Our Commitment to You
In return for the rights You grant above, the Maintainer commits that:
1. Your Contributions will be made available in a version of the Project
distributed under the GNU Affero General Public License version 3 or later, or
under another license approved by the Open Source Initiative. The Project will
not become closed-source-only.
2. Your Designated Employees will be credited in the Project's commit history, and
their authorship will not be misrepresented.
---
## 5. Your Representations
You represent that:
1. You are legally entitled to grant the above licenses, and the person signing
below is authorised to bind You to this agreement.
2. Each Contribution submitted by a Designated Employee is an original creation of
that person, or You otherwise hold the rights necessary to submit it under the
terms of this agreement.
3. You will use reasonable efforts to keep the Schedule of Designated Employees
current, and You accept that Contributions submitted by any of Your employees or
agents through an account You control are covered by this agreement whether or
not that person is listed.
4. Your Contributions do not knowingly violate any third party's copyrights,
trademarks, patents or other intellectual property rights.
---
## 6. Third-Party Work
Should You wish to submit work that is not an original creation of a Designated
Employee, You may submit it separately from any Contribution, identifying the
complete details of its source and of any license or other restriction (including
related patents, trademarks and license agreements) of which You are aware. Mark
such submissions conspicuously as **"Submitted on behalf of a third party: [named
here]"**.
---
## 7. Support and Warranty Disclaimer
You are not expected to provide support for Your Contributions, except to the
extent You desire to do so. Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in
writing, You provide Your Contributions **on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES
OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND**, either express or implied, including without
limitation any warranties or conditions of TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT,
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
---
## 8. Notification
You agree to notify the Maintainer of any facts or circumstances of which You
become aware that would make these representations inaccurate in any respect.
---
## 9. Governing Law and Miscellaneous
This agreement is governed by the laws of the **Federal Republic of Germany**,
excluding its conflict-of-law provisions and excluding the United Nations
Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods.
The exclusive place of jurisdiction for all disputes arising out of this agreement
is the Maintainer's seat in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.
Contributions are made **without remuneration**, in exchange for the commitments in
section 4. No payment of any kind is owed to You or to Your Designated Employees
for them.
If any provision of this agreement is or becomes invalid or unenforceable, the
validity of the remaining provisions is unaffected, and the invalid provision shall
be replaced by one that comes closest to its economic purpose. This agreement
constitutes the entire agreement between the parties concerning Contributions and
supersedes any prior understanding on that subject.
---
## Schedule — Entity Details and Designated Employees
| Legal entity name | |
| Registered address | |
| Registration / company number | |
| Contact name | |
| Contact email | |
| GitHub organisation (if any) | |
**Designated Employees**
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
**Signed on behalf of the entity**
| Name | |
| Title | |
| Signature | |
| Date | |
---
*Contact: licensing@zond.rs · This agreement is adapted from the Apache Software
Foundation Corporate Contributor License Agreement v2.0.*