Thank You Sir May I Have Another

I just received an email from an Autodesk dealer and it mentions that essentially all 2004 versions of Autodesk design products including AutoCAD, AutoCAD Mechanical, Architectural Desktop, etc. are being “retired” on March 15, 2007.

Under this coercive policy if an Autodesk customer does not purchase an upgrade by a stipulated date they will be forced to purchase an entirely new license of the software to move to the latest release.  And if you don't roll over the pressure will be significantly increased when they purposely ensure that later versions do not read the DWG format of these older versions.

So if you purchased AutoCAD 2004 say in September of 2004 for full price -- or almost $4,000 -- you have a product that is well under three years old and you are now forced to give Autodesk more money or they will proactively screw you.

This practice is truly appalling.  Why will customers of this company accept this?  Are people truly so complacent or ignorant of the market that they will just allow this sort of blatant disrespect of their patronage?

Folks, there are way too many choices out there to accept this type of customer hostile behavior.  I have often mentioned forced retirements by Autodesk in the past, often in a tongue in cheek manner, but this really stinks.  How far will Autodesk customers let them go before they say no?

I used to work for this company and there was a time when I looked back on that proudly.  Now I see a slow-moving follower that is blatantly willing to shaft their customers to pump up their numbers.

This goes against every fiber of our being at Alibre.

If you are an Autodesk customer and you accept this behavior then you need to realize you are a part of the problem.  Your dollars are reinforcing this, both by rewarding them for their disrespect of you, and also by not rewarding those who are truly working to move the industry forward, earning your business through respect and adding value.

When you write your check you might as well go ahead and put “thank you sir may I have another” in the memo line.  Then bend over and get ready for more.

Comments

[Pedro Aroso]

Another good reason to move to Archicad.

[Jay]

Just curious but how many versions does Alibre have and how many back versions does it sell or support? Or does Alibre sell and/or support an unlimited number of their product versions.

Thanks in advance for any info.

Jay

[David Cohn]

Greg:

I think your response to Autodesk's retirement policy is just a bit harsh and somewhat of a disservice to your readers. As an independent observer of the industry I've got a different take on Autodesk's position.

Autodesk has announced that it will no longer provide reduced-price upgrades for customers running AutoCAD 2004-based software if they do not upgrade by March 15, 2007. Prior to that date, customers can upgrade to the latest version for a discount below the cost of a new seat. After that date, a customer wishing to obtain a copy of the latest version of the software will have to pay the full cost for a new seat. Please also note that at present, AutoCAD 2004 has already been superseded by three subsequent releases, and by March 2007, Autodesk will be announcing yet a fourth newer version.

Software retirement policies are designed to compel, not force, customers to upgrade. Like many other software companies, Autodesk began selling software under a perpetual license scheme. That worked well for many years as new customers entered the market, but for most companies operating under such a scheme, as the installed base grows the company realizes that it is missing out on a significant income stream if it doesn't convert customers to some sort of ongoing maintenance contract. That's why many newer programs today are sold under an annual-use rather than perpetual-use license. As a result of its policies, many Autodesk customers have switched to an annual “subscription” that includes perpetual use and all upgrades, yet costs less than buying an annual upgrade.

Autodesk is not unique in its software retirement or “sunset” policies. Indeed, I recently faced a similar situation with Intuit, but in that situation, Intuit instituted a much more draconian strategy. Intuit not only retired the version of my accounting software, but as a result of the software’s reliance on the Internet for some of its functions, on the retirement date the company disabled features that I had previously relied on. So, not only would I need to upgrade by the specified date or else have to pay full price in the future, but if I didn’t upgrade by that date, my software would no longer provide its original functionality. Now, that’s truly appalling. Autodesk’s policy falls far short of that.

There is nothing about Autodesk’s policy that forces a customer to upgrade. It is entirely up to the customer. AutoCAD 2004-based products will continue working indefinitely, and customers may continue to use them. And there is nothing new about this policy. Autodesk did exactly the same thing this year and over the past several years with earlier versions of AutoCAD-based products.

I also think you do your audience a disservice when you claim that Autodesk will “purposely ensure that later versions do not read the DWG format of these older versions.”

Newer versions of AutoCAD have always been able to read DWG files saved using older versions of the software. This has been true since the earliest days of AutoCAD (which as a former Autodesk employee, you surely know), and there is absolutely no reason to suspect or to imply that this would not always remain true. If Autodesk were to change this policy, I suspect the company would immediately face significant lawsuits.

Autodesk has also made available free tools to enable anyone to translate DWG files from newer versions of AutoCAD so that those files can be read by earlier versions of the software. The company doesn't have to take this step to ensure backwards compatibility, but does so because significant numbers of its customers requested this capability and it makes business sense to do so.

So let’s be clear here. I’m not defending Autodesk or its policies. I have certainly “called Autodesk onto the carpet” when the company has done a disservice to its customers. But what Autodesk is doing in this case makes good business sense. And customers are not blindly or ignorantly accepting Autodesk’s policies. Each customer must look at the functionality provided in the current version of their Autodesk software and judge for themselves whether it makes sense for them to upgrade to the new release or stick with their current version, which will continue to work just fine, thank you.

Autodesk’s customers can choose to upgrade if the newer version provides features that customers see as offering significant improvements, or stay with their older software, fully cognizant of the fact they will pay more if they subsequently decide to upgrade later down the road.

[Len Sihlis]

The company that I work for is still using AutoCAD 2000 and we see no advantage to upgrading. After all, it is only 2D.

[R. Paul Waddington]

Greg,
These comments of yours are right on the mark. Customer inatentiveness has led Autodesk to make some very bold decsions and implimented policies that are stageringly anti-customer. I should know I am also a reseller of Autodesk products and have been so for over twenty years. Whilst I agree with your comments 100% you did leave out that Autodesk's dealers are the pervayers of Autodesk policy and as such are the ones responsible for 'hoodwinking' the customers into accepting the abuse you define. As recently as the last few days I have received information from another dealers customers that clearly indicates the end-users are not being told what they are being trapped into and even when I explain it I get the comments, "well what choice do I have, I now know I am being lied too but there is nothing I can do?". AAAAAh! I scream, when I ring-off, can't they see how they are screwing themselves, their mates and the market in general. Should I bother.
But I would add one more point. Your article indicates there is a choice, in part your correct but you are also incorrect. By making statments such as you have you are also 'part of our problem'. You provide Autodesk ammunition to argue against me when I am dealing with gov't bodies that could put a stop to Autodesk's antics and abuse of its customers. The competition and choice you elude too is not what it seems. This point I would be more than willing to discuss with you further if you so chose.
R. Paul Waddington
Proprietor
cadWest.

[ralphg]

While I disagree with Autodesk's policy of pressured-upgrades, I'd like to make a couple of corrections.

If you miss the three-release limit to upgrade, you still get a discount from the full list price, even going back numerous releases.

Autodesk has free stand-alone software for reverse-translating newer releases of DWG for older versions of AutoCAD. (SolidWorks has a version that runs inside AutoCAD.)

OTOH, Autodesk is placing tremendous pressure on customers to (1) upgrade to more expensive software, and (2) also purchase subscriptions. How much pressure? Well, try downgrading software, say from ADT to AutoCAD.

And no one can beat the policy of Infacta (I use their software for bulk mailing upFront.eZine): they charge as much for an annual support fee as the original cost of the software: 100% subscription fee!

[Chandrashekhar]

I fully agree with Alibre CEO. Autodesk has been playing this extortion tactic for many years now for a software that is neither high tech nor something that is exceptionally different in terms of any great functionalities that it offers compared to other similar CAD platforms except for a very few exceptions. It's like milking the same cow for as many years by giving a stable diet regularly so the cow also feels convinced it can't get that diet from anyone else and produces more and more milk!

It is high time that AutoCAD user companies form a more meaningful consortium and migrate to other 'stable diet' available abundantly in the Globe and not get controlled by Autodesk till the last breath!!

[Evan Yares]

"Newer versions of AutoCAD have always been able to read DWG files saved using older versions of the software..."

Not exactly true, David. And you ought to know it.

Many years ago, Autodesk dropped support for reading versions of DWG prior to 2.5. There was no technical purpose to this -- the only practical effect it had was to to force people to upgrade. (In AutoCAD 2007, they have restored the ability to read DWG files from version 2.0, but not from earlier versions. This may have happened as a result of my public comments.)

In its lack of support for reading early versions of its native file formats, Autodesk is unique among the largest CAD vendors.

[kosie]

CEO Alibre:

Some of my friends run Alibre. OK product but for this; they claim that there is no way to open a file that is one dot (.) different in release. How compatible is that?

[Greg Milliken]

Actually Kosie, we commit a substantial amount of our development resources to provide forward compatibility of our native file format with our current version from all previous versions. We do not provide backward compatibility (i.e., reading in a file from a newer version in an older version).

We also provide two ways to do this, one is with our native format (i.e., AD_PRT, AD_ASM, etc.) and the other is with the Alibre STEP format, a special extended version of STEP that contains all the parameters, constraints, features and history associated with a design, along with being able to store the complete assembly and drawing if one exists.

It is possible that your friends may have run into a problem we are not aware of, but if so they shoudl report this as a bug and we will work to resolve it.

In any event, all vendors may have problems in dealing with old files and I think this is reasonable. It is the cynical attempt to coerce the customer to upgrade that I have a problem with.

[moyesboy]

So on your server you have legacy data that goes back the the day your company was founded. This includes CAD info created with the version of your system that was current at that time.
So now you are still using that same casting and always got it from the same supplier and the drawing never got edited for XX years, but now you need to refine the design. I guess currently usually this would be a drawing print on microfiche, but soon it will be an archive copy of a CAD file - you'd better hope its not in autoCAD2.5!
So who pays for the time converting the obsoleted cad format into the current one? Is there a free batch conversion tool? This is why each new version of a cad system must be able to open and read files from the very first version of that cad system.

Now also you might want to look and see what happens to Alibre users who fall behind with their maintenance, after so long getting current on maintenance costs quite bit more than the annual charge, then after a bit longer you have to pay the whole purchase price again to get current. Sound familiar? Well, yes, but there is a big difference in that the costs involved are a small fraction of the autodesk charges!
:-)

[Greg Milliken]

Actually, an upgrade to the latest version of Alibre Design never reverts to the full price of a new license.

The way one obtains an upgrade is to be on active maintenance. The price of maintenance does increase if one lets their maintenance lapse, although we provide a short grace period, and again if one's license is two or more releases behind the current version, but it never increases beyond that, and the price remains far below the full price of a new license.

Our maintenance policy is published on our web site at http://www.alibre.com/products/maintenance.asp.

Thanks,
Greg