I love Rational tools but as I mentioned to my IBM sales representative “I am beginning to suspect that the Rational Marketing team has never left the 60’s and is still “tripping” when they decide to put their pricing together.\u00a0 That or they took their sales class from PT Barnum (“There’s a sucker born every minute…”). ”\u00a0 The source of the pain here is that as a developer enrolled in IBM’s wonderful (and it IS wonderful) developer discount program, I had two primary complaints:<\/p>\n
1) You receive no notification of expiring Software Maintenance Agreements (SWMA)<\/p>\n
2) Trying to sort out what the final costs will be based on the various discounts and product ID’s is nothing short of alchemy….<\/p>\n
#1, I am happy to say, has been “fixed”.\u00a0 I did receive notification that my SWMA was expiring. But every year is an adventure and this year was no exception! The IBM OS and licensed programs are very simple, I never have a problem with them.\u00a0 But when it comes to the Rational products, you can never really know how the pricing will come out.\u00a0 Fortunately, I only have ONE Rational product – RDP (it has been through many naming conventions: WDSc, WDSCi, RDi, RDP and if I can believe what my IBM sales rep says, it is now RDG) but the constant name game leads to confusion every year as to *what* exactly, needs software support.\u00a0 This year I was finally able to narrow it down to my two licenses of RDG.\u00a0 “Send me the quote” I said!<\/p>\n
What I received first surprised and then confused me.\u00a0 The quote I *thought* I would receive was $548 for *both* my licenses. You have to remember that this is a developer *discount* program and everything on the i IS heavily discounted.\u00a0 Everything BUT the Rational tools.\u00a0 The cost of the OS (nada).\u00a0 The cost of the supporting OS products, nada!\u00a0 Cost of the Rational tools? 131% of list!\u00a0 Yeah, you read that correctly.\u00a0 For a developer ‘discount’ program the actual tools cost you MORE than if you purchased them retail.\u00a0 Tis the “Smarter Planet” at work at IBM!\u00a0 I am just hoping that Microsoft (which *discounts* it’s tools) doesn’t catch wind of this cash cow approachfor IBM…..<\/p>\n
My SWMA on *each* copy of RDG is $548.\u00a0 My cost if I buy a license with 1 year of support from IBM “retail”: $416.00\u00a0 You would *think* that a developer discount would produce a *lower* cost for the developer.\u00a0 Gee, I wonder why RPG developers *don’t* move to use Rational tooling?\u00a0 Hmmm, could it be the (ir)-Rational pricing?<\/p>\n
Just once I would love to be surprised in a happy way by Rational pricing.\u00a0 Developers should get a discount when there is a ‘developer discount’ offering don’t you think?\u00a0 Apparently the Rational division thinks not…..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I love Rational tools but as I mentioned to my IBM sales representative “I am beginning to suspect that the Rational Marketing team has never left the 60’s and is still “tripping” when they decide to put their pricing together.\u00a0 … Continue reading