As I mentioned in my SmartInspect Update, we’ve finalised the new pricing structure.
There were two main factors I was trying to balance with the pricing:
- treat customers with an existing subscription fairly
- make SmartInspect accessible to a broader range of customers
I think what we’ve come up with balances those two goals appropriately, but as always, I welcome your feedback.
Editions
This should be easy. There are no different editions for SmartInspect. No Standard, Professional, Enterprise, Super-Mega-Ultimate, etc. There’s just SmartInspect and that has everything in it. All the languages, all the tools, everything.
OK, next topic.
Subscriptions
As before, SmartInspect is sold under a subscription model. The license is perpetual (meaning if you don’t renew your subscription, it’ll keep working) but if you keep your subscription active you’ll get all new versions that are released as well as support if you’re having problems.
A 12 month subscription costs US$ 99 and the optional renewal for a further year costs the same (US$ 99). This is different to how SmartInspect worked under Gurock, which had a significantly higher upfront cost, and then a lower renewal. In my experience, this is confusing for many people and makes budgeting for subsequent years harder than it should be. So instead we’ve decided to keep it simple and just have one price.
What happens if you decide not to renew, and then later on change your mind? No issue, just buy it again when you’re ready. It’s the same price as the renewal anyway.
What about people with existing subscriptions?
If you still have an active subscription, thank you very much for hanging on.
First, you’ve not had any updates for quite awhile. I can’t do anything about what happened prior to us acquiring SmartInspect, but from my point of view, anyone who had an active subscription on the day we took over, were effectively paused. It’s not fair that your subscription should be used up while you’re waiting for us to deliver a new version. So from that day until the day we deliver a new version, your subscription is paused. When we deliver a new version, it’ll continue on.
Put another way, we’ll extend all existing subscriptions by the length of time it takes us to get that first version to you.
Second, if your existing renewal price is lower than the US$99 price I mentioned above, no worries. We’ll honour your existing renewal price for as long as you keep it active.
OK, when can I buy it?
Well, as above, I don’t think we should take any money until we can deliver something to you. Based on my other update, that day is close. The Product Page is live, but the Buy Now and Trial links will go live on the day we ship.
I’ll also have one other announcement for existing and past SmartInspect customers on launch day, so stay tuned for that.
Thanks for the update. Is it possible to include SmartInspect Console source (with extra fee)?
Hi, while we will be providing source for the client libraries, we won’t be providing source for the console itself.
Can I ask why you would need it? Maybe we can achieve what you need some other way.
Cheers
Malcolm
Long, long time user of SmartInspect (oh for the days of Delphi). I don’t mind paying a subscription and I use to – I love SmartInspect and it’s in pretty much everything I write these days (C#) but, yeah, I stopped paying when they stopped releasing any meaningful updates.
Back then it came with the source (thankfully), so I modified it to work under .NET Core.
To my point: I’m going to have to see some significant and regular updates to functionality to pay for a subscription. I’ve seen too many of these devolve into a trickle of minor bug fixes. I also understand that’s the trick with a product like this – what I don’t want to see is a bunch of bloat from the need to justify a revenue stream. It’s a bit of a tightrope.
I am cautiously optimistic and will continue to watch.