The OpenDocument Foundation was formed in 2005, with the mission "to
provide a conduit for funding and support for individual contributors to
participate in ODF development" at the standards body OASIS.
So, at a time when backing for the ODF format seems to be gaining in
strength around the world, eyebrows were naturally raised when Sam Hiser, the
Foundation's Vice President and Director of Business Affairs,
wrote on October 16 that it was no longer supporting ODF: