Hi folks,
Let me welcome you to the group by putting up a question which I have been
struggling with for the past few days.
Many of you in the hi-tech world are probably aware that Microsoft has
developed its Services Provider License Agreement (SPLA) to sell software
on a pay as you use basis. this allows enterprises or web developers to
subscribe for the software on a monthly basis as opposed to paying a huge
upfront cost. The financial advantages are obvious to the consumers, they
get to pay off the software costs as business operating expense as opposed
to capital costs.
My question is around pricing. Microsoft says their software under SPLA
is priced so that customers pay the same amount, over the life of the
software,in paying on a monthly basis, as they would have paid
upfront. Now, how does Microsoft or any other software developer be able
to predict the life of a software when technology is changing so fast?
Does anyone have any idea what industry standards are? Does anyone have
any idea on how software could be priced and packaged differently.
Any thoughts, insights will be appreciated.
--
Kumar Pandey
Chief Operations Officer
Flatburger Inc.
