{"id":29312,"date":"2023-08-22T10:07:21","date_gmt":"2023-08-22T09:07:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/?p=29312"},"modified":"2023-08-29T08:08:14","modified_gmt":"2023-08-29T07:08:14","slug":"software-maintenance-fees-are-increasing-what-can-your-enterprise-do-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/2023\/08\/22\/software-maintenance-fees-are-increasing-what-can-your-enterprise-do-about-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Software maintenance fees are increasing. What can your enterprise do about it?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Inflation-justified price increases by vendors should be met with renewed service expectations from customers says <\/em><\/strong>David McDougall, CRO, Spinnaker Support<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many enterprises are now questioning whether inflation-justified price increases for software maintenance are necessary, coming from vendors who have been massively profiting from support contracts for a long time. And for the kind of prices the vendors are quoting, you would expect exceptional, unparalleled support and maintenance. But is that what you\u2019re getting?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However much your firm is paying for software maintenance, it\u2019s almost certainly a lot more than it was this time last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, rising prices are nothing new. Generally, enterprises can expect their software maintenance fees to rise in line with the headline inflation rate of the country they\u2019re located in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But when we\u2019re talking about millions of dollars\u2019 worth of software support, an increase of even a few percentage points is a significant financial commitment. Nobody is happy about this, but many enterprises respond with resignation; they simply bite the bullet and pay up. Prices are rising across the board, after all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it\u2019s worth remembering that the software giants make an eye-watering 90% margin on their support business. Many enterprises are now questioning whether these inflation-justified price increases are necessary, coming from vendors who have been massively profiting from support contracts for a long time. And for the kind of prices the vendors are quoting, you would expect exceptional, unparalleled support and maintenance. But is that what you\u2019re getting?

All too often we speak to customers who are upgrading solely because they need their systems supported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As with any major software update or upgrade, your enterprise will only really see a marked benefit in functionality for end-users if all applications are upgraded, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting your database up-to-speed with the vendor\u2019s latest release which they\u2019re marketing and pushing heavily is all well and good, but if your enterprise is still relying on legacy apps and hardware to do their jobs, how will your users \u2013 and your enterprise \u2013 actually benefit?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The actual operational improvements could be imperceptibly small.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve now arrived at a difficult place: your ERP maintenance fees are rising and you\u2019re not even sure if your systems will be supported going forward. What else is there left to do but upgrade \u2013 even if it means little operational gain?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The third-party support alternative<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps the <\/em>most important consideration before embarking on a software upgrade or refresh is whether it\u2019s in your enterprise\u2019s best interests. To stay supported is not a good enough reason to keep upgrading in line with your vendor\u2019s expectations and demands. If the latest software upgrade doesn\u2019t make business sense to you \u2013 and doesn\u2019t align with your transformation, growth and business objectives \u2013 our advice is: don\u2019t go through with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any other vendor’s timeline should not have to mirror yours exactly so that you can get the best out of your software stack. In fact, your enterprise should be able to leverage its software maintenance services to supportyour exact requirements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your enterprise shouldn\u2019t settle for anything less than a bespoke, personalized software system that works hard for the business and its users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A bespoke support and maintenance package may sound like an expensive endeavour, but it doesn\u2019t need to be. Gartner revealed that by partnering with third-party support vendors, enterprises can cut the cost of maintaining their legacy ERP systems by as much as a half.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These cost savings are significant. Economic global fallout from COVID-19, inflationary pressures, and the economic aftershocks of the invasion of Ukraine have prompted enterprises to scrutinize their books more closely, looking for viable options to cut costs while ensuring their operations keep running securely and smoothly. Gartner notes that these financial factors are urging more and more enterprises to ditch their support contracts provided by the ERP giants in favor of third-party alternatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, third-party software support deals made up 45% of all technology deals negotiated across APAC, North America, and EMEA in 2021-22 \u2013 a rise of 18% compared to the previous year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Substantial OPEX savings aren’t all. Find the right third-party maintenance contract, and you\u2019ll be working with a support partner.<\/em> The value-added services on offer include: helping enterprises streamline their budgets, ensuring software works in tandem with transformational objectives and supporting legacy systems and applications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the driving ideas behind third-party software support is that you, the customer, will always come first. Whether your priority is to optimize your current operations or move towards a hybrid software environment, it\u2019s our job as your support partner to enable that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crucially, opting for a third-party support partner offers enterprises flexibility: a better range of contract options (no paying for support for products your enterprise doesn\u2019t use), expert advice and consultancy on software upgrade, transformation and migration options – and specialist maintenance for products that vendors leave unpatched and unsupported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By forcing upgrades and continually increasing maintenance costs, vendors have gifted their customers an opportunity to start looking elsewhere in the support market. It\u2019s not up to the vendor how to run or manage your ERP systems \u2013 you want to understand your options, plan your enterprise\u2019s future carefully and with stakeholder buy-in and then make decisions about change, acceleration and growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question your support partner should be asking you is \u201chow can our services help you achieve that\u201d, not \u201cwhen will your enterprise fall in line with our objectives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Support deadlines and fee increases imposed by vendors should not rush your enterprise to make critical business decisions. Work with a support partner who understands that and watch your enterprise continue to flourish and succeed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Inflation-justified price increases by vendors should be met with renewed service expectations from customers says David McDougall, CRO, Spinnaker Support Many enterprises are now questioning whether inflation-justified price increases for software maintenance are necessary, coming from vendors who have been massively profiting from support contracts for a long time. And for the kind of prices […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":29313,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1463,1272,40],"tags":[157,2921,4812,4811,91],"class_list":["post-29312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apac","category-expert-voice","category-software","tag-apac","tag-enterprise","tag-ian-collins","tag-inflation-justified-price","tag-software"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29312"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29312\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29485,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29312\/revisions\/29485"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/apac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}