We get many phone calls from people interested in selling Open Dental in one form or another. We directly provide our customers with software (and updates) and support. We do not provide the compiled version of Open Dental to others who only want to resell it and provide support. However, under the GPL License, others are allowed to distribute (package, sell, and support) the software themselves.

If you are interested in becoming a distributor, please start by reading this page. If you still have questions, need more information, or would like to become a referrer, contact Business/Marketing at vendor.relations@opendental.com

Suppliers and Consultants in the Dental Industry

If you are a supplier or consultant to those in the dental industry, and have customers who would benefit from Open Dental, please refer them to us for the purchase of software support. This includes:

• Computer IT networking and support companies
• Hardware consultants: You would assist with hardware and networking. We would provide software support.
• Equipment and supply dealers
• Dental Integrators
• Consultants
• Supplemental software vendors (e.g., clearinghouses, digital imaging, appointment reminders, patient communication, etc.)

The customer would contact us for software and support, but contact you for other services. For installation issues, we can work together to make it easier for the customer.

Distributors

There are a few companies that actually attempt to compile, package, sell, and support Open Dental themselves. This is a truly massive undertaking and involves the following issues:

• There are many issues that we don't publicly document. We have over 20 years of institutional knowledge that cannot be duplicated. Your customers are likely to end up with mild or severe database corruption that is expensive to fix.
• We have a conversions department that uses proprietary software to convert databases from other practice management software products. We don't provide this as a service to non-customers, so you would be on your own to decide how to handle those.
• If you make even the slightest change to the source code, then you must rebrand the software to be something other than Open Dental, which is trademarked.
• CDT License: The full version of Open Dental includes copyrighted CDT content, including the ADA claimform, and the ADA procedure codes. Because this content is copyrighted, we are not allowed to include it in the source code. We have a license to distribute this content to our paying customers only. Distributors can also obtain their own license to distribute this content. Go to https://www.ada.org/publications/ada-store-products/licensing-for-commercial-users and apply for the "Practice Management Software License". But we have heard that the ADA might have a minimum number of licenses that can be purchased (100?). Also, you're on your own when it comes to somehow distributing a digital list of CDT codes to your customers. There are no licensing issues for Canadian procedure codes.
• An installation program is not included in the source code. There are a lot of references and dependencies to maintain.
• Open Dental Software, Inc. provides a number of supplemental services to customers. You would not be able to provide these same services to your customers unless you build something from scratch.
  • Online Forms
  • eServices
  • Patient Portal Feature
  • Electronic Prescriptions
    • DoseSpot eRx
    • Legacy eRx
• Our 3D tooth chart is separately copyrighted. It's not critical to the functionality of Open Dental so it's not covered under the GPL. The published source code includes an inferior 3D tooth chart based on older technology.

We will respect your customer relationships and never try to take customers from you. Keep in mind some users may call us on their own, we may not be aware of your relationship with them, and we may inadvertently try to sign them up. If we become aware of a previous relationship, we refer the customer back to the original company. If a company cannot provide adequate service, we sometimes agree to support the customer after an honest and reasonable attempt at reconciliation. To prevent this from happening, provide good customer service. It is important to answer the phone and to return messages promptly.

List of Distributors

We directly sell, distribute, and support Open Dental ourselves. You do not need to contact any other distributor to obtain the software or support. If you are a potential customer browsing this website, you should call us directly rather than calling one of the companies below.

Here is a list of distributors that we are aware of and appear to be active.

• Practice-Web
• Prime Dental
• Kapricorn
• Lajenda Technologies
• Phenom Systems
• HRDSq
• DMA Tech Solutions

The following distributors appear to no longer be active.

• Ashtel
• Econtek
• Sakthi Medical Systems
• The Digital Dentist

Foreign Countries

For distributors in other countries, see International Customers. Because of time zone and language differences, we are not able to provide extensive support to dental offices in many foreign countries. Local software developers sometimes fill the gap by distributing and supporting Open Dental themselves.