Microsoft Pays University $250K To Use Office 365

BogenDorpher writes "Microsoft has offered to give the University of Nebraska $250,000 dollars to make the switch from IBM Lotus Notes to Office 365, which they say offers newer technology, greater flexibility, and operational savings. Microsoft did this in hopes that the University would not make the transition over to Google Apps."

Comments

Gracious Outrage

[improfane]

At first I was outraged that Microsoft "discounted" (read: bribed) the uiversity to switch but then I realised that the students are probably grateful because

  Lotus Notes is a horrible horrible piece of software. Microsoft might be evil but Lotus Notes is the scourge. I would happily endure a Windows only hell over a life of Lotus Notes.

IBM probably did this to the university to begin with, no system administrator would use Lotus Notes willingly.

It went a little something like this

[Anonymous Coward]

University of Nebraska: "I don't care what the benefits are. You'd have to pay me to use Microsoft's Office 365."
Microsoft: [Takes out a checkbook.] "How much are we talking about?"

Re:Want Failure? To the cloud!

[Ferzerp]

No. RTFA. They discounted conversion services by $250k. The school is still paying for the product. This is commonplace in the industry.

"Sure, we want to swap from x to your product y, but it will cost us too much to transition"

"How can we help out so that we get a revenue stream from your subscription/maintenance (that still makes us money in the long run)?"

Who needs accuracy (though the linked story had the same inaccurate headline)?

Re:Steve Ballmer..

[Elbereth]

Ballmer offers incentives. Gates dictated. I'll take Ballmer over Gates any day, because you can at least turn down Ballmer's incentives. If you stood up to Gates, you were destroyed.

I would contrast Sculley and Jobs in a similar manner, though not nearly so strong.

Article is a lie.

[RightSaidFred99]

Unless my alarm company is also "paying me $300" by installing my monitoring equipment for free and 3 months of free service so I will then pay them a monthly, 2 year contract guaranteed amount of $30.

The University is paying for the service, but getting free services and a discount. Article makes it sound like Microsoft is paying them to use Office 365, which is untrue.

Adobe vs Quark

[LoudMusic]

This sort of thing happens in education. Software producers know they need to plan for future users so they give it to the kids who they hope will buy it. Some coworkers of mine at an advertising agency said their professor called Quark (makers of QuarkXpress) asking for educational discounts for 30+ licenses and were told there was no discount. At the time the license cost was something like $1200 per seat. So they called Adobe and asked for educational discounts on InDesign, new at the time, and Adobe just gave them everything they wanted at no cost.

Worked in their favor too. When those kids hit the working world they only knew InDesign and their employers were forced to switch. We did. And never looked back.

"Then Adobe hit the market in 1999 with a program called InDesign (now used by Inc.). In 2003, Adobe launched its Creative Suite, which rolled in products such as Photoshop and Illustrator with InDesign. Quark couldn't come close. Its U.S. market share tumbled from 95 percent to just 25 percent ."

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100401/can-quark-turn-the-corner.html

If you want to sell your product give it to the educators.