Last week Computer Weekly published a selection of user responses
to Microsoft's licensing terms. Here, Duncan Reid from Microsoft
replies to readers' concerns
Customers' views are of prime importance to Microsoft and when we
announced License and Software Assurance in May this year it was
after listening to customer feedback.
We had been hearing that Volume Licensing had become complex and
difficult to administer.
To improve our licensing programme we had three objectives in
introducing License and Software Assurance:
- Simplification: An end to the "alphabet soup" of upgrades that
had existed previously, replacing it with a much simpler model
- Greater choice: Our customers, whether larger enterprises or
small businesses, are operating in every kind of market and many of
these markets are volatile and unpredictable. With License and
Software Assurance, customers can now licence per desktop or per
enterprise, perpetual or non-perpetual - whichever is best for
their business
- A move towards Microsoft .net: The way people buy and use
software will change dramatically as we move towards software as a
service. We wanted to make it easier for our customers to take
advantage and reap the benefits of our .net products in the
future.
Since the announcement in May, customers have told us that they
like the License Software Assurance model.
However, we also got feedback that they had two concerns: timing
and value.
It became clear that we had underestimated the amount of time
customers needed to evaluate the options and make informed
decisions, even with the original extension to 28 February 2002.
Therefore, after listening to customers, we announced last week an
extension of the launch period to 31 July 2002.
Customers with "current" versions of software can now enrol
directly in Software Assurance until 31 July. Also, Upgrade
Advantage will continue to be available until 31 July 2002.
Customers will benefit from the extension. For example, with
Office, we introduced promotional pricing so that Office Upgrade
Advantage costs marginally more than the version upgrade yet offers
considerably more value. Specifically, this is the ability to
upgrade from Office 95 (or later) and up to two years of upgrade
protection, which the version upgrade did not offer.
To increase the value to our customers we are including Office 2000
in the list of "current" products, which means that they will be
able to enrol any Office 2000 licence directly into Software
Assurance, and will have until 31 July 2002 to make this
decision.
This significant change will make it easier for many more customers
to benefit from Software Assurance.
Initial feedback suggests that these changes have met the main
concerns that some of our customers originally had with License and
Software Assurance.
Many will benefit from License and Software Assurance, seeing a
decrease in cost over time - for example, those customers who are
renewing Enterprise Agreements and those who have purchased Upgrade
Advantage in the past.
However, we do recognise that if you only want to upgrade products
every five or six years then Software Assurance will probably not
suit your needs. Either way we will be working closely with
customers, and through our partners, to make sure they make the
best decision for them.
We want to thank customers for their feedback and continue to
welcome their views. Our customers have helped us to understand
where we didn't get it right initially with License and Software
Assurance and how we could improve it.
In the end, our success will be determined, as always, by our
ability to create products so compelling that our customers want to
buy them.
Duncan Reid is UK licensing manager at Microsoft