Let's say you renew every 4th year in December or January.
Year 1 -- 2008 (3995) Year 2 -- 2008 Year 3 -- 2008 Year 4 -- 2011 (2* 850 + 1395) = 3095 Year 5 -- 2012 Year 6 -- 2012 Year 7 -- 2014 (2* 850 + 1395) = 3095 Year 8 -- 2015
Total Cost of Software = $10,185 which is 25% less than staying on maintenance. In this eight year period you miss 3 new releases and get all stable releases. Even renewing every third year is about a 22% saving and fewer missed releases. The big trick is getting the VAR to sell the initial seat without maintenance which probably isn't a good idea if you are just starting out. This also won't work if you are in a growing company that needs new seats every year.
I don't mind paying maintenance when I get solid software on the date of payment.
Since I have been paying maintenance in Dec or January and not using a new year's release until about summer, I'm losing out paying money early so I won't have a late fee.
All these schemes to get more money out of users (loyal users) is being done because SolidWorks CAN NOT release solid nearly bug free updates on January 1 each year. To try to sucker in users, SolidWorks releases a beta under SP0 on your existing years' maintenance fee, hoping you get sucked in and will therefore be willing to pay maintenance.
I would dearly love to get an SP 0 and have other early users report online that there are no bugs they can find and thus recommend everyone load up SP0. It would make paying maintenance fees OK.
Let's put this in perspective. Even with the policy change, SolidWorks Corp is still better than competitors.
PTC - you must backpay maintenance to the expiration date AND pay a
25% penalty.
Autodesk - One release behind, pay a $995 Upgrade Fee AND Subscription Service Two releases behind, pay a $1495 Upgrade Fee AND Subscription Service Three releases behind, buy a new license. NOTE: Subscription Service does NOT include tech support
Don't get me wrong, I prefer the $500 reinstallation fee, but the weeds are still worse on the other side of the fence.
Jim, glad you noted the differences. I don't review other CAD packages.
I am NOT against charging a fee to reinstitute maintenance services including customer support. That is, well, normal business that is known upfront going in on a "deal". There is one part of the deal that is NOT revealed when you buy, though, and not a part of any "guarantee" or "warranty of fittness"; specifically that the software will be stable and not have any broken features (if they are broken, leave them out).
What I would like is a fully functional SP 0 on January 1. I simply hate paying on January 1, then not loading the application until August or September when it gets to SP 5.
If a company can't get the software right until August-September, then it ought to be released as SP0 for the following year.
I learned back in 98+ days that not all SPs or releases are production ready. What I had to put up with back then pales with today's experience. I would say that learning to differentiate problems with the software from problems with the user is what has made us stronger, more savvy users (as opposed to stronger, more savvy designers and engineers).
With my scheme and SW current very early release the software should be stable about the end of the year. Couple that with the usual end of year software specials and SW could again become cost effective.
We have to bear in mind that SW has not increased the base price ever so they are in effect getting $2971.24 in 1995 dollars for a seat today. However, in 1995 they sold just a few thousand seats whereas now they are selling 100,000s of seats per year. The cost of the software doesn;t increase with increasing sales, only the cost of copying and shipping goes up. Even the cost of bugs doesn't go up because there are (and this is hard to believe) only a finite number of bugs.
Just hypothetically:
1995 Sell 5,000 seats in 1995 ($19,975,000) Sell 4,000 maint. aggreements ($5,580,000) New features weren't released or announced till they were considered ready inside SW.
2008 Sell 200,000 seats ($594,200,000) in 1995 dollars Sell 500,000 maint. aggreements ($518,760,000) in 1995 dollars New features are promised and then never show up (like the ability to save back a version).
It would be interesting to see what percentage of this gross income went into development in 1995 versus 2008. And then Dassault got their hooks into SW. At first they towed the line, but later I think they really started pushing for returns.
Finally, Jimsym states that SW is still better than the competitors. I wonder. Working with UG I have found that one thing is certain, when I call in with a problem it gets solved then and there for me. SW considers problems solved when an SPR is issued. And UG loads and runs well on far less hardware than SW does. It may be a pain to use, but given the number of times I have had to relearn SW, this steeper learning curve doesn't look as bad as it once did.
Peter Drucker: =93To be prepared for change ... work on the most expensive of resources - TIME ...=94
"Looking back": Interesting words, as they illustrate how major decisions executed from fear can adversely affect products.
Windows: 1990s promises by Gates for "Industrial Strength" operating system. What came out was not Industrial Strength, and indeed MS was never an expert at operating systems, but just cobbled things together, and arguably could have done far better given the demonstrated success of UNIX and other stable OS's on mainframes (which was needed by SolidWorks users)..
Legacy Code: Windows continued to try to be "all things to all prior OS versions", creating memory, registry, dll, and other issues causing crap and corruption (not needed by SolidWorks users).
Unsecure "Features": To help their OEM customers & developers implement their own form of adware on low cost beige box systems.
Programming environment: Various coders have made notes about the lack of top notch tools and consistency.
New Revolutionary OS: Longhorn pared down and back and years late, and not anything like was promised.
As a counterpoint Steve Jobs realized the need for a whole, high quality networked OS system based on a stable, maintained kernel to which a user interface could be added along with top notch programming tools, update system via a network and that core OS was UNIX. Steve did that decision based on what was already obvious to someone watching networking in the 80s as networked offices & the Internet was approaching.
Microsoft could just as easily have picked UNIX, but they didn't want anyone "copying", like they did starting with the CPM port which became DOS that MS bought. Microsoft could just as easily pick UNIX today. Instead we are left with XP Pro or Vista and stripping them down to work as good as possible for SolidWorks. The counterpoint to that? Steve Jobs realized that the Unix OS kernel was NOT where all the proprietary advantages lay, but that the programming systems and user interface were where all the customer value resided.
Microsoft has missed the boat, thinking they have to "do it all" on the OS. MS could also easily have picked a Unix kernel and moved ahead solidly like Apple (& lots of other companies that use Unix).
What does that give SolidWorks Corporation? An unstable programming environment on somewhat sensitive (unstable?) hardware that runs Windows.
What does that give SolidWorks users? Software and hardware that is a bit unstable and not easy to debug or make stable.
Ballmer is strictly a salesman oriented manager, and attempting to keep the OS & Office & Server monopoly he controls. Can Ballmer turn Windows into a 21st Century OS. I think he could, but do not think he will.
So where will SolidWorks go in 5 years? Maybe where Unigraphics and others already operate, in Unix?
Where will SolidWorks users go in 5 years? If MS fails to deliver, I personally will probably move to UG. That means I am likely not to be alone in these thoughts.
Peter Drucker noted that in a knowledge society that the most important thing you can do is do things which stop wasting time, picking paths which cease to waste the efforts of your most valuable people, knowledge workers. He wrote this starting in the 60s, and followed it up with over 3 dozen books on management and the future of business.
Peter Drucker (who died last year at about 96) would have no trouble seeing the problems with computers and software systems that waste incredible amounts of programmer, user and corporate time, just because the OS and its programming tools are poorly designed.
SolidWorks is going to face a big challenge, and I don't know if hanging onto Windows will serve it well. In the end, I care only that I don't waste my time, as once gone, I can never recover lost time. SolidWorks must become more efficient for me or I will naturally migrate to systems that don't waste my time.
All Bo's BS above? Take it as you like it or not. I do think I can see trends, however, and it is plainly visible.
Looking back at MS's promises to deliver an "Industrial Strength OS" in the mid 90s, and what has happened since does NOT give me confidence that the OS SolidWorks runs on will continue to be efficient. That is particularly true, when you add FEA applications on top, and as SWks itself becomes heavier.
MS is afraid to run a UNIX kernel, as they can't "control" their OS. Jobs realized you wanted a solid kernel and that UNIX was maintained very well. Jobs also realized you had to have a terrific set of programming tools and accommodated networking (secure networking) in the User Interface almost seamlessly, and Apple bought into it with the aquisition of NEXT. MS could do the same, but it is run by Ballmer, a totally wacky salesman.
If SolidWorks becomes more unmanageable on Windows, it is simple that I will migrate to Unigraphics. Prior promises over and over If I am looking at this, I can't be the only one.
Peter Drucker: =93To be prepared for change ... work on the most expensive of resources - TIME ...=94 Peter noted that a knowledge company must do what it can to not wast time of its most critical resources: knowledge workers. Time wasted can never be recovered. Some companies lose sight of this when confronted with long term company health. I'm not going to ignore inefficiencies, as I have a finite amount of time left.
Not many people remember AmigaOS. Way ahead of it's time in '86. Stable, true multitasking, 1024 colors, an extremely fast graphics system even by todays standards and everything modular and open.
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