It's not just about size, it's also about the mix of products that you use.
We have less people than you (about 60), but more servers (over 150 right now), and use a mix of Microsoft products including SQL and Exchange. This gives us a lot of points for negotiating, even at our size. SA gives other benefits besides renewal rights within the term of the license. You also get some support and some training benefits. If you were doing it for Windows only, I'd have to say that the track-record for SA is below par. For Office, it's a no-brainer, and for other members of the Microsoft product family, it's break-even at worst, and offers some price breaks on occasion. We negotiate our pricing through a VAR, with collaboration from Microsoft. You can always negotiate it to some degree... -*ASB*: http://XeeSM.com/AndrewBaker Providing Competitive Advantage through Effective IT Leadership On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 5:34 PM, Ben Scott <[email protected]> wrote: > On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 5:23 PM, Tim Vander Kooi <[email protected]> > wrote: > > You negotiate your SA renewals with Microsoft the same way you > > can negotiate price with them up front for Licenses and SA. > > How big do you have to be before MSFT starts to care? When I > checked a few years ago, for my current employer (120 people, ~ 75 > computers), we were too small to have any negotiating leverage. MSFT > told us to call a reseller (e.g., Dell, CDW). Reseller quotes their > standard price. :-( > > On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 5:30 PM, Tim Vander Kooi <[email protected]> > wrote: > > [Software Assurance] also makes a great deal of sense when you > > have an EA or similar since they basically throw the Client OS > > licenses and SA in for free. > > Sounds like this might be a "large vs small company" thing. > Enterprise Agreement is way out of our reach. > > -- Ben > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~
