If you customers are already asking for it to be open-sourced, or if you have partners in mind who will support this endeavor, this is a good start. If, on the other hand, you open-source without a good PR push to partners/customers/developers it's like a tree falling in the forest; will anyone be around to listen?
We open-sourced from the beginning and then found clients; it was a long haul. We eventually found a toehold in developing countries, and were able to build up client credibility from there. If you already have a plan for using the OSS to sell right away, then maybe this plan is for you.