Looking to offset poor Windows 8 adoption rates, Microsoft Corporation has raised the prices of its various enterprise software offerings by up to 400 per cent, a move that would affect Indian businesses adversely.
By charging more for what the company calls a ‘user client-access licence’ (CAL), the increase will hurt small and medium businesses (SMBs) in specific, where the trend of bring-your-own-device to work has become increasingly popular.
Microsoft offers two types of licences - one being a user-CAL, and the other a device-CAL. SMBs prefer to avail themselves of the user-CAL, which is charged by the user, and allows employees to use a number of devices for the same network. The cost of a number of user-CALs has increased by 15 per cent.
Joseph Landes, General Manager, Developers and Platform Evangelist, Microsoft India, confirmed the development, and told The Hindu that rise in prices was in tune with the value offered.
“We always try to price our products as best as we can, keeping in mind our customers. We believe that the value that is packed into those software offerings is worth the prices that we are charging now,” he said, while refusing to comment on whether the increase would be applied uniformly to Indian consumers.
Mr. Landes was here on Wednesday to launch 14 Microsoft Innovation Centres.
