Cefas maintaining the repository is less appropriate than cytobuoy maintaining the repo.

[JoeRibeiro]

Cefas would need to liase with the manufacturer whenever a new model is rolled out, but the license is strange, and combines standard crown copyright with partial private company ownership.

Copilot tells me these are the licensing consequences of crown copyright:

Crown Copyright cannot simply be “given up” or abandoned.
You cannot unilaterally assign it to a private company.
You cannot retroactively pretend Cefas didn’t create it.

✅ But here is the practical workaround everyone is gravitating toward
Even though you can’t drop ownership, you can:
✔ Stop maintaining the Cefas-owned version
✔ Archive it
✔ Cease distributing binaries
✔ Hand over operational control by pointing everyone to CytoBuoy’s maintained fork