Luis Villa
Vice President, Legal at Sonar
San Francisco, California, United States
Summary
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Senior🎓
Top SchoolLuis Villa is a seasoned legal executive specializing in open source, technology licensing, and community strategy, currently serving as Vice President, Legal at Sonar in San Francisco. With more than a decade of experience spanning startups and non-profits, he has led legal, culture, and community initiatives aimed at making open source sustainable and developer-friendly. He previously co-founded Tidelift as General Counsel, guiding the company’s legal and community-building efforts to support developers and improve open-source ecosystems. Earlier roles include Deputy General Counsel at the Wikimedia Foundation and leadership of Wikimedia’s Community Engagement team, where he oversaw contracts, licensing, product counsel, and multi-million-dollar grantmaking. An active open-source practitioner and former Mozilla Fellow, he has shaped licensing frameworks (notably the Mozilla Public License revision) and advised on licensing, product, and strategic partnerships across the tech sector. Luis holds a JD from Columbia Law School and a BA in Political Science from Duke University, and he combines legal rigor with a passion for open collaboration from his base in the San Francisco Bay Area.
12 years of coding experience
15 years of employment as a software developer
BA, Political Science, BA, Political Science at Duke UniversityJD, Kent Scholar '07-'08; Stone Scholar '06-'07, '08-'09, JD, Kent Scholar '07-'08; Stone Scholar '06-'07, '08-'09 at Columbia University School of Law
Stackoverflow
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Github Skills (136)
python10
image-processing10
python-310
cross-platform10
pypi10
rfc10
licensing10
image10
xslt10
imaging10
spdx10
schematron10
xml10
wordpress9
wordpress-api9
Programming languages (13)
Github contributions (5)
tieguy/innovators-patent-agreement
May 2013 - Oct 2013
Contributions:33 commits in 4 months
agreementpatentipa
tieguy/OSM-collabmark.org
Aug 2016 - Feb 2017
Contributions:103 commits, 33 PRs, 97 pushes in 5 months
free-culturetrademarks
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