WSO2 is an open source software company founded in 2005 that produces an entire middleware platform under the Apache license. Their business model involves selling comprehensive support and maintenance for their products. They have over 150 employees with offices globally. The document discusses using Apache Cassandra as a NoSQL database with WSO2's Column Store Service, including how to install the Cassandra feature, manage keyspaces and column families, and develop applications using the Java API Hector.