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MS Partners Bailing Over Delays In Releases
Frosty Piss writes "A new study says past delays in Microsoft's products are causing some businesses to think twice about renewing the long-term service agreements that include rights to upgrade to future versions of its programs. 26 percent of the 61 IT professionals surveyed by Forrester Research said they had decided not to renew their Microsoft Software Assurance agreements when they expire, opting instead to buy the software as needed." Microsoft says the study is not representative of what it's hearing from its customers.
The big question is whether they were asking IT people in large businesses, midsized, or small ones.
I can see smaller businesses and some mid sized ones not renewing, but most of the larger ones will probably continue to do so because it's easier.
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
Software Assurance was always a bad idea. It is clear that if you hand over the money before the work is done then they are far less likely to do the work as quickly as they would if you didn't pay until the work was finished. This is true in the real world (builders or decorators) so why shouldn't it be true with MS? They already have your money and so they don't really need to work hard. Companies should definitely tell them to stick it and buy as and when they feel the need to upgrade. Clearly very little of the software MS has produced since introducing SA6 has been of any value and I suspect the uptake would be much lower if people hadn't already paid up front. Don't be fooled twice is what I say, keep the money in your bank earning interest, not theirs.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
Perhaps they simply feel that the software assurance makes no sense when the actual software releases are steps behind the OS releases. The only thing keeping them instep is microsoft's cutting ties of backwards compatibility. Bravos IT managers.
I don't think microsoft will ever admit what it hears from it's customers.
They certainly won't admit to what they've heard from me.
Skiffy is Spiffy, but Ort is tort.
Because in the long run over other supported contracts its more affordable. Its not just a license but a pretty robust support infrastructure that is included in your pricing and scales well for businesses large and small and more times than not is cheaper than retail pricing.
Just my experience. Software Assurance is more like the commercial linus world where the value is the service & support rather than the actual software - as it is to more businesses than not.
Cost of the software itself is very little of the ultimate price at the end of the day. (not claiming its absolute, but very true more than not)
If you read the article, in the last paragraph it quotes the MS representative thus: "Microsoft's Sloane countered Forrester's findings by pointing out that about 75 percent of the company's Enterprise Agreement customers are renewing those pacts." Well, if only 75% are renewing, doesn't that mean 25% aren't??
And the forrester report said 26%. I bet that's inside the margin for error of the survey.
Microsoft says the study is not representative of what it's hearing from its customers.
:(
Microsoft owes me a new keyboard
Between that and "The next version of Office will be worth the wait!" or "Longhorn will be out in Q4 2005, we promise!", I sprayed coke all over my monitor and keyboard...
Software assurance lately hasn't really been worth a damn to businesses. There are more than a few legacy apps that don't work in Vista and few businesses are switching. I know of at least one Microsoft Vista call center that is staying on XP for call logging and business stuff (they give a second pc to techs to play with / walk customers through stuff)
Office 2007 might look different with its magical little orb, but you'd have a real hard time justifying the purchase if you had to pay for an upgrade in a medium sized office at $250+ a seat. Getting it for "free" makes it slightly more attractive, but the downside of retraining employees is still scary for a bunch of businesses - especially when the 2007 file format pack is a pretty small install.
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I'm not MS fan (I have linux running on everything where I have a choice), but because of customers that use various MS products, it seemed cheaper when starting my business to subscribe to their Action Pack Subscription (MAPS). They give you more than enough licenses for all the major products (office, server, workstation, visio, maps, etc) which is perfect for reading those files that customers send without forking over the big bucks up front. You have to pay over $300 yearly, which if they were releasing often, it would make sense.
But I'm about to approach the point where purchasing everything outright makes more sense, and they still haven't sent me anything more than a beta for Vista. So if my customers want me to support them, either I'm using a beta to do so, or I have to fork out the cash even though I'm subscribing to MAPS. This may be the last year I renew my subscription unless they have a lot of new software entering the pipe. The worst part is should I cancel, I'm guessing the MS police will be knocking to verify that I don't have anything unlicensed still in use, which I wouldn't, but my time does equal money.
Microsoft says the study is not representative of what it's hearing from its customers.
Microsoft: You're not going to bail on me are you? You love me don't you?
Customer: No, I wouldn't do that. You're really "nice".
Microsoft: You mean it? I mean, you're not still upset with me about the chair throwing thing, right?
Customer: Of course not. I mean, I'm still using you on some of my desktops...
Microsoft: So why are you still using XP? You hate me, right?
Customer: Er, uh, well, uh, we were planning on upgrading but we've been a little busy with our Linux migration in the data center and all, and, uh, well would you look at the time! I've got to get going. I'll see you soon...
Microsoft: See, he really does love me! That darned study is just not representative of him!
Tune in tomorrow for the next episode of MS-in-de-nial...
When Windows 95 came out, lots of companies and individual users were leery of switching over from their working-just-fine Windows 3.11 systems. I remembered seeing a demo of Windows 95, and someone was asking whether they could disable the animated graphic display that played during the file copy process.
Microsoft has a long history of, well, "stubbornness" isn't too harsh a term. NT 3.1, Bob, and ME were all products that didn't make the grade as far as most people were concerned. However, they kept marketing them while they worked on replacement technology and/or service packs. Thus, we got NT 3.5, Windows 98 SE, and Windows XP, which all simply ran into the "new product" glitches and bitches.
I honestly think that Microsoft will just keep on marketing Vista until they get at least one service pack, and possibly two. At that point, they'll either have shaken out most of the bugs that people are complaining about, or will come up with a different package, a different name, a different UI, and call it a "brand new" product.
Is Microsoft hurting? Perhaps, but I don't believe they've been sending out large numbers of pink slips to their employees. Are people looking at alternatives? Yes, but many of them are either going to sit tight and hope that XP will last long enough until either Vista SP 2, because they have too much of an investment in existing technology to feel comfortable (rightly or wrongly) with anything else.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
It's not so much that anyone should believe this "report".
They're in the business of whoring themselves out to whomever has the biggest wallet.
That they're turning on Microsoft says more than their reports ever will. If they don't sell "reports", they don't get paid. So are more people looking to buy "reports" that do NOT favour Microsoft now? Has the market changed that much?
if i buy it.
i work in corporate IT sales, and it simply seems that this survey was done almost immediately after a major desktop OS and office suite release. it seems to me that many companies, especially in the SMB market would be more inclined to not renew SA now, and purchase it in the future before the next major releases. this seems to be consistent with what i've seen with my customers, some of who have opted to not renew SA on desktop OS and office, however renewed SA on server 2003, with the release of server 2008 on the horizon.
anyway, plenty of companies are still renewing their EA and Select and MOV agreements, whether they truly need all the features or not. remember, you get a lot more than free upgrades w/ SA.
my $.02
not only is time travel possible, it's irrelevant.
I'm not sure, is this a troll? If so, well done sir!
If not you clearly don't know how Microsoft licensing works. You don't keep or maintain proof you own anything. It's all registered through Elicensing on Microsoft's own site. If you buy from vendor A they put in the paperwork with Microsoft and send you a copy so that you can authenticate through the licensing site. From there you can download any licensed product and you have a full inventory of all licensing you have purchased all in one place, serialized, and even commented.
Also, if you're a VL purchaser then you aren't activating Windows anyway as VL Windows XP at least doesn't require activation. With Vista there are a whole myriad of other options available even if they are more of a pain than with XP but don't kid yourself, there are a lot of options.
As for compliance checking, that is easily accomplished with an on-sight database. Hell, make it a Debian box running mysql. A simple login script can query all the installed applications and write all the information into a central inventory. Alternatively you can use Microsoft products for compliance monitoring such as Operations Manager and Systems Management Server if you have the money for such products.
Naturally there are plenty of open source compliance systems out there as well that make it perfectly easy to make sure you're not only in compliance with Microsoft but also Adobe and any other big software maker out there.
I would be curious about the number of businesses the BSA has investigated that have an existing VL agreement with Microsoft. I don't think it's ever happened although I recognize that it could happen so I guess it doesn't make any difference.
At any rate, genuine media is only a problem with Microsoft's retail products. OEM and VL products have different keys are difficult and/or pointless to fake in the case of a VL product since you can download the media yourself from the Eopen site.
no, it's exactly the same. Only Microsoft had little motivation to produce the upgrades because you were locked into a long term contract and they weren't required by the contract to produce ANYTHING. Also, SA only included a little support. Good luck calling to request a bug fix just for you. They'll take your $100,000+ but still treat you like a chump.
OSS vendors include support with maintenance for the full term. Often you get access to actual programmers and not sales people. I've worked with vendors that have put out a product patch just for the bug we found on a support call.. it's pretty cool! Even with mighty IBM, I've gotten actual programmers involved in bug issues because I had all my patches applied and troubleshooting steps followed. In that respect Microsoft isn't a "good" supplier unless you spend millions with them. When you deal with good companies, you see how poor Microsoft really is at their core business of making software. They're a "one trick pony" that merely has a lot of money in the bank.
What Microsoft hears from its customers probably involves a lot more profanity.
If I planned to cancel a subscription, the one I subscribe to would be the LAST to know until it's time to sever the bonds. First of all, it saves me from the constant pestering from their marketing dept. to get me back on board for longer. And second, how inclined are you to support a customer that already declared very clearly that he's not going to be your customer much longer?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Many shops I know that buy SA rationalize their purchase claiming "support costs are lower".
It has been my experience that those shops need to make the support calls because they deployed a "bleeding-edge" product. (Bleeding-edge is defined as any microsoft product before service pack 1)
The IT shops that I have traditionally run do not buy SA. My strategy is simple - WAIT. Why do you need Exchange 2007 server RIGHT NOW? Is Exchange 2003 really not up to the task?
I've had success deploying products late in the software cycle. This gives Microsoft time to fix the bugs (and update the knowledge base), it gives ISVs time to support Microsoft's new product, and when something does go wrong that we can't solve in-house, we just pay the $250 per incident.
This also gives me the leverage to beat up my Microsoft representative when a new product does come out. The product must have added value or we don't buy.
-ted
I believe that line should read:
Microsoft says the study is not representative of what it wants to hear from its customers.
IT departments regain some sense.
It was stupid agreement for any consumer to sign. MS tried to sell it like an IOMN service level agreement;which would explain why some companies thought it was a good idea. The IT departments failed to take into account MS's track record and the fact that they will cut support for older software with little notice.
FYI 18 Months it too short of a notice, 30 months is more appropriate.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Of course it is, but "With a gun in your mouth, you only speak in vowels".
Same thing though it sounds different.
Have you read the moderator guidelines? Well, have you, PUNK? (and I want a Karma: Gnarly option)