Jump from Maintenance to Subscription

[f700es]

Well the time has come, our maintenance subscription renewal is coming up and AutoDesk has marked up the maintenance cost and dropped the subscription cost to where it is a no-brainier to switch. I will only save $300 this year to switch but next year my maintenance will jump 40% and no increase for subscription for next year and no more than 5% going forward per year. So next year I save $1,238. Alas I see no logical reason NOT to switch.
The plus side is the increase of software available to me and my users.

[ReMark]

We did something similar early this year.  I find the use of extortion by AutoDesk rather insulting to long time users of the program.  Additionally, we switched our multi-user network license for our building process engineering group to BricsCAD Pro.  This move will be re-examined at the end of one year and a determination made as to whether the company stays with AutoCAD or goes all in for BricsCAD.

[f700es]

I could switch my 5 LT users to DraftSight or other with little issues but myself and 1 other have to have full AutoCAD due to intragration into Archibus WIMS. It only works with full AutoCAD.

[tzframpton]

First of all it's not extortion - Autodesk is not in any way forcing you or threatening with force to buy their products. 

 

The subscription model works great for my business. I'm a small business with six total employees on W2 payroll, one being an administrative assistant therefore five users of Autodesk products. I was able to scale up easily as I grew my office. I have heard R. K. McSwain's posts regarding "owning" software and I do agree with having that option, but for me I can scale up or down annually as I need. Maybe it's because I'm a small business that makes me see things in a different perspective. 

 

This allows my company to utilize the "zero-based budget" process on an annual basis. I like this, personally, especially from an economic perspective. I mean, from a purely economic perspective, if I ever had to liquidate from going out of business, I can sell all of my physical assets (computers, desks, office furniture, cubicles, server, etc) but I'd be hard pressed to find a buyer of my Industry Collection Suite x5, and that's only if Autodesk's EULA says I can do so. 

 

I don't know about others but I've never shunned the subscription model. So f700es I think you'll be fine. Either way you can try it for a year and crunch the numbers in 12 months and see how much it was worth it for your company's money to go subscription. My $0.02 worth. 

 

-TZ

[f700es]

Well with the cap of 5% increase per year it will take some time to get to what new users are paying. It's pretty much a no-brainer and yeah I think we'll be fine