If you need to upgrade an existing software license or subscription, do a little research first and you might just save yourself or your business some money. I assumed that if you already owned a software product and the support agreement was expiring, it would less expensive to renew it rather than buy a new license. Well, in this particular case I was dead wrong and pretty ticked off!
I just attempted to renew the subscription/support agreement on my security software, PC-cillin Internet Security from Trend Micro (NASDAQ: TMICY), and it turns out the cost to renew the support and be eligible for an upgrade to the latest version was $49.95. On top of that, they require an additional $4.95 for something called an "Extended Download Service" that appears to be a fee to Trend Micro's e-Commerce partner, Digital River (NASDAQ: DRIV)!
I had just about completed the online transaction to renew both licenses I own, which was going to cost a little over $100, when I remembered another software company, Computer Associates (NASDAQ: CA), had tried to bleed my employer when they tried to upgrade their enterprise backup software to the latest version. It turned out to be significantly less expensive to buy new licenses as if we never owned the product, than to renew our support agreement with CA and upgrade.
I visited Newegg.com and discovered that not only was a new license about $15 cheaper than renewing, Trend Micro also offers a 3-user license of the same software for about half of what I would have paid to renew my two licenses. You better believe I never completed the support renewal and bought the 3-user license instead!
This lesson may not hold true for all companies or all software products, but remember that you can always try to negotiate upgrades of your enterprise software directly with the vendor or with a Value Added Reseller (VAR). Should negotiations fail, other software vendors will most likely offer competitive upgrades for the products you do own. You might even want to do some research to determine the savings related to a competitive upgrade and present that to your current software vendor as leverage for negotiations.
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