Hello? <vent>

[Robert J.M. Edis]

G'day all

How come the Cognos people have been so quiet on this issue in this
forum?

My understanding is that software pricing is a complex issue taking into
account a) what the consumer will pay, b) how much it costs to create
and support the product and c) what competitors are charging.  

What a product is worth to a customer is based on more than just its
purchase price.  Besides that and support charges are "can I find people
who know this product and what do THEY cost?", "How robust will my
application be if made with this product instead of another?", "How
quick can I build/upgrade my application in this product vs another?",
etc.

I have heard a lot of anecdotal evidence to show that an application can
be created in PowerHouse in 1/3 to 1/5 the time it takes in other tools.
Given all other factors (people costs, training, hardware, etc) being
equal this translates into significant cost savings as the product
purchase and support charges are only a small part of a project's
budget.

My gripe is not what Cognos charges client sites for production licenses
but what it charges for development licenses.  VB et. al. are affordable
to a large range of developers and are therefore more popular,
irrespective of how good a product it is for large scale application
development.  Cognos NEEDS to build developer support as it is from this
group that purchase decision makers will arise (or be persistant
lobbists).  

Axiant is a good tool but costs too much for the average developer to
buy and try.  Cognos should release different versions of the package.
E.g. a cut down version with no migration tools and SQL database for
under $250, a 'professional' version with additional tools and limited
support for under $600 and the full 'enterprise' version for under
$2,000 (all USD).  These prices are more in line with VB, Delpi,
PowerBuilder, etc.

Enough from me, over to you.

Blue
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