Jeff Prince Posted September 17, 2024 Share Posted September 17, 2024 One of my clients just told me their salesperson said service select is ending in 2027 and everybody will be put on subscription at that time. I would like to know if there is any truth to that. 1 Quote Link to comment
E|FA Posted September 17, 2024 Share Posted September 17, 2024 If true, I will probably stick with the last Service Select version for a few years before even considering a subscription. 3 Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 17, 2024 Share Posted September 17, 2024 (edited) I would have thought it is more likely that VW at some point starts to increase VSS fee until it is more expensive than Subscription. But I don't think it is unlikely VW will just end running VS contracts/options at one point either. Marketings stated that running VSS will not change in the future - with the hint that they can't know what changes/happens in 3 years or so and what will be then. So 2027 will be a perfect more than "3 years" in future. VW should do so. VW have still a market leader position in Event market, maybe in Landscape Arch, but like others, unfortunately lost market share significantly to .... Revit, in AEC. I am happily looking forward to this. Doesn't make much sense holding redundant CAD/BIM packages anyway. And my VW career is already 10 years now, which is my longest CAD App marriage so far anyway. So far I expected I would escape with the first/next VSS price increase demand, which I expected somewhen at the end of this year or so .... If my other CAD/BIM App at one point also falls into Subscription or irrational price increases I am looking forward to finally end with Blender and Blender BIM .... ahm .... now called Bonsai. And I don't have to care about, internet reactivation every 3 month, number of activated machines, .... again. Edited September 17, 2024 by zoomer Quote Link to comment
FlyingHoward Posted September 18, 2024 Share Posted September 18, 2024 Hi all, not at all news to many but I'll throw this out here anyway. My thought on this is that the moving of all customers to Subscription has already started with the launch 2025 and its install manager. Subscriptions seem to be the norm with an increasing number of applications. Perpetual software is a dying breed, especially given the rate of OS and or hardware changes. My opinion only, and for the record, I still love VW for my workflow. Quote Link to comment
Matt Overton Posted September 18, 2024 Share Posted September 18, 2024 (edited) They really need to up the pace of useful features in updates if they are subscription only. Or drop the price to be competitive. that is thing with subscription promises of future good no longer matter. The software can only charge for what it delivered that month. Edited September 18, 2024 by Matt Overton 2 Quote Link to comment
E|FA Posted September 18, 2024 Share Posted September 18, 2024 29 minutes ago, Matt Overton said: The software can only charge for what it delivered that month. In comparison with the competition and the cost/disruption of switching to other software. I’m wondering how many Service Select license holders will take a look at other options if they’re forced into a higher price point and subscription. Or, like me, would plan on making due with the last “permanent” version, at least for a while. Before VSS we only updated every few years and it worked out fine. 1 Quote Link to comment
GregG Posted September 19, 2024 Share Posted September 19, 2024 (edited) That would be terribly disappointing. As per today's VW store site information, subscription cost for the Design Suite is listed at $1,980.00 billed annually. Service Select is a friendlier $ number to manage in comparison. I could imagine many would see this as a reason to look around for alternative ways to produce design work deliverables. Edited September 19, 2024 by GregG ... 2 Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 19, 2024 Share Posted September 19, 2024 (edited) On 9/17/2024 at 11:53 PM, zoomer said: I would have thought it is more likely that VW at some point starts to increase VSS fee until it is more expensive than Subscription. Not yet Subscription price (?), but I got a 23% VSS price increase in August 2022. Today, 2 years later, I got another 33,3% increase offered. I think for me it's about time to say goodby ..... Edited September 19, 2024 by zoomer 1 Quote Link to comment
Popular Post Jeff Prince Posted September 19, 2024 Author Popular Post Share Posted September 19, 2024 On 9/18/2024 at 12:47 PM, FlyingHoward said: Perpetual software is a dying breed, especially given the rate of OS and or hardware changes. I think it has more to do with predictable cash flow for the software publisher. They became like health clubs, cable tv, or dozens of other services that hope you don't notice their continual renewals autobilled to your checking account. From an investment perspective, who doesn't want to be on that gravy train? That being said, Rhino and the Affinity Suite are still very reasonably priced perpetual licenses. They use that fact to create value, like Vectorworks used to. 5 Quote Link to comment
digitalcarbon Posted September 20, 2024 Share Posted September 20, 2024 (edited) an observation from a cloud cancelation I did a year ago. I was subscribed to OpenBOM which is cloud based. My work in that area fell off to the point that I stopped my subscription. I did not know what that would mean. But I just went on today and have access to all my work and can edit it. not sure where the program stops working but its to their benefit to not delete my stuff as work may pick up again & they want me back. So this idea that canceling a subscription means a deletion of all your stuff did not happen with this company. side note, its a good program . It works like Google Sheets but more geared for inventory, parts etc. Also, I never experienced any crashes nor version update issues during my several years of use. Edited September 20, 2024 by digitalcarbon Quote Link to comment
napwszzm Posted September 20, 2024 Share Posted September 20, 2024 On 9/18/2024 at 9:25 AM, Jeff Prince said: One of my clients just told me their salesperson said service select is ending in 2027 and everybody will be put on subscription at that time. I would like to know if there is any truth to that. I was told that the Service Select will be ended in 2028. Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 22, 2024 Share Posted September 22, 2024 On 9/21/2024 at 12:49 AM, napwszzm said: I was told that the Service Select will be ended in 2028. I wonder if that is even necessary until that time. If they go on by that pace with increasing VSS fees. Subscription may feel cheaper for most already in 2025 or 2026. Quote Link to comment
Tom W. Posted September 22, 2024 Share Posted September 22, 2024 10 minutes ago, zoomer said: I wonder if that is even necessary until that time. If they go on by that pace with increasing VSS fees. Subscription may feel cheaper for most already in 2025 or 2026. Assuming subscription rates don't go up at the same pace as well 🤣 1 Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 22, 2024 Share Posted September 22, 2024 Who cares 😉 On 9/19/2024 at 10:36 PM, zoomer said: I think for me it's about time to say goodby ..... Done ! And it feels good. 1 Quote Link to comment
Christiaan Posted September 22, 2024 Share Posted September 22, 2024 As VSS buyers we already see ourselves as effectively paying a subscription, so whether it's subscription or VSS doesn't much matter to us. What matters is whether the cost, over say a 5-10 year period, remains competitive. Being on a subscription model does make it easier to switch to other subscription software, because you're not invested in a perpetual licence. Perhaps Vectorworks can offer discounts to users that switch from perpetual licences to subscription plans. Or simply a progressively lower subscription cost based on how long you've been an annually paying customer (whether perpetual or subscription). Do any other CAD vendors do this already? Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted September 22, 2024 Author Share Posted September 22, 2024 2 hours ago, Christiaan said: Do any other CAD vendors do this already? Everybody negotiates. Autodesk will practically pay you to come back. Quote Link to comment
Matt Overton Posted September 22, 2024 Share Posted September 22, 2024 2 hours ago, Jeff Prince said: Everybody negotiates. Autodesk will practically pay you to come back. Or take you court claiming you must be stealing their IP as no other CAD software exists so you must be hacked copies for their software. 1 2 Quote Link to comment
Jeff Prince Posted September 23, 2024 Author Share Posted September 23, 2024 29 minutes ago, Matt Overton said: Or take you court claiming you must be stealing their IP as no other CAD software exists so you must be hacked copies for their software. Yeah, I have heard some real horror stories about that at a few big firms regarding not having enough licenses for number of users, etc. They sure seem to know how to market their junk. Quote Link to comment
Popular Post Christiaan Posted September 23, 2024 Popular Post Share Posted September 23, 2024 10 hours ago, Jeff Prince said: Everybody negotiates. Autodesk will practically pay you to come back. But Vectorworks could always break the industry mould and institute a transparent loyalty discount, based on how many consecutive years a licence has been annually paid. 7 Quote Link to comment
Tom W. Posted September 23, 2024 Share Posted September 23, 2024 2 minutes ago, Christiaan said: But Vectorworks could always break the industry mould and institute a transparent loyalty discount, based on how many consecutive years a licence has been annually paid. Got to be worth a VE 😀 2 1 Quote Link to comment
Christiaan Posted September 23, 2024 Share Posted September 23, 2024 11 hours ago, Tom W. said: Got to be worth a VE 😀 I submitted one 😀 2 1 Quote Link to comment
Christiaan Posted September 23, 2024 Share Posted September 23, 2024 I also added: "Cancel your subscription for a year or more and you lose your discount. Or perhaps gradually lose your discount for every year you're not subscribed." On that later point, if you had subscribed consecutively for enough years to reach a discount, say 5-10 years, and then cancelled for some period, there could be a window within which if you resubscribe and make up for the lost time then you could regain your discount, or some level of it. Rather than starting from scratch. 3 Quote Link to comment
Matt Overton Posted September 24, 2024 Share Posted September 24, 2024 4 hours ago, Christiaan said: I also added: "Cancel your subscription for a year or more and you lose your discount. Or perhaps gradually lose your discount for every year you're not subscribed." On that later point, if you had subscribed consecutively for enough years to reach a discount, say 5-10 years, and then cancelled for some period, there could be a window within which if you resubscribe and make up for the lost time then you could regain your discount, or some level of it. Rather than starting from scratch. Out of the options in the market Vectorworks is arguably the best late career or semi retirement BIM /CAD. Till now a lot of designers would have reverted to hand drawing or morphio and other digital drawing boards but soon their is going to increasing numbers of CAD native older designers would could be the target of such a product. Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted September 24, 2024 Share Posted September 24, 2024 (edited) On 9/22/2024 at 9:22 PM, zoomer said: Done ! Hmmh, eMail seems to be ignored or went under the radar for two working days. I sent it via support request again. So far still VW business as usual for me somehow. Let's give VW a another few days to realize ..... Edited September 24, 2024 by zoomer Quote Link to comment
zoomer Posted October 10, 2024 Share Posted October 10, 2024 OK, about two weeks later quitting VSS was officially accepted without any noise or issues. But during those 2 weeks I had too much time to think about the consequences. Here : the need to convert 10 years of projects : - batch migrate to a current VW file format - export all VWX to other CAD/BIM App(s!) readable file format(s!) Before, as a typical Mac user, I upgrade macOS to a version which is no more supported by my last perpetual VW version. Which in the worst case could already happen shortly after WWDC 2025 with the first Public Beta release of macOS 16. As I can't be sure if I will really still get all VW 2025 Service Packs after VSS end in November (since SPs are now renamed, for a reason ?) and I would not want to rely on a VW 2025 perpetual at its current state. VW 2024 support for macOS 16 is pretty unlikely. So the goodbye timeframe wouldn't be impossible but too narrow to allow a relaxed transition. Therefore I proposed my plan change and offered another year of VSS duration. Which in this case took only one week and was again officially accepted without any noise or issues. The only other reason was that I mildly thought about gambling by inserting the amount of this VSS price increase into the VW Roadmap lottery, to bet that VW comes clear and finally allows/releases/supports a Speckle Connector ! Or, as do not tend to gamble, the other way round, if a VW Speckle Connector would happen during VW 2025 and I could no more get access to it - I may never get the chance for a second Speckle Connector and finally Collaboration/Exchange with my Blender (or QGIS) Quote Link to comment
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