Graphisoft - Nickel and Diming its customers

[rm]

Priority Tech Support within 24hrs was free, many years ago, now you must pay for it through an ArchiPlus subscription.

Next Teamwork was included with full licenses. Now you get a basic level service for free, which essentially is useless. Now you have to pay for the full service as well if you want to use it. Keep in mind, this happens while Graphisoft keeps telling us that ArchiCAD is THE tool of collaboration, IF you are willing to pay extra to collaborate!

While the "new" BimX was introduced in Las Vegas this year, to be used via a web portal instead of on a portable device; Graphisoft states on their literature that the "new" BimX will be free until they work the bugs out of it....Fantastic. Then they are going to charge for it.

How many add-ons will be needed to be paid for before Graphisoft's lust for profit is filled? These additional fees may not impact their large installation clients, or as Graphisoft likes to call them "Key Customers", but what about all the smaller and medium size firms? It's as if Graphisoft has no clue as to how narrow margins are for architecture practices. I'm not stating they should not make a profit, of course they should; but they are going to cause firms like mine to look elsewhere if this trend continues.

Come on Graphisoft, remember the thousands of smaller practices that put you on the map and have kept you there!

[DGSketcher]

rm wrote:
Come on Graphisoft, remember the thousands of smaller practices that put you on the map and have kept you there!

+1 Solid business comes from serving and creating happy customers not corporate greed.

[Richard Morrison]

I'm not sure you are clear on the concept. Teamwork IS included, it just requires your own server, which was always the case. BIMcloud is a completely new service, where that server is now in the cloud, and is provided by GS. You may want this convenience for free, but GS has not taken anything away from you that you had in the past.

The desktop BIMx (actually Bim Explorer) never had access to the full set of 2D documents. They now have created a web version that gives you the same functionality as the BIMx app, and are not charging for it. Complaints seem premature.

Priority tech support for free is something that may be debatable, but given the other benefits of ArchiPlus (for me, mostly in the private BIMx models hosted by GS), version upgrades, lost key insurance, etc.) I'm not willing to complain too loudly. Things cost more today than they did 10 years ago, and it's not just GS.

[rm]

Richard -

I think some of your criticism of what I wrote may be justified in that I was interchanging Teamwork with BimCloud. I am not asking for conveniences for free, like many I buy the ArchiPlus subscription for multiple licenses. I am making the case that IF we are in the world of collaboration now, why are we paying extra for it? Why doesnt GS simply have one version of BimCloud (full) for all its ArchiPlus subscribers instead of the "Free" version vs. the subscription version. Again, everything is going to cloud based storage, so why would anyone want to continue on with storing the data on a local server, maybe for speed sake, perhaps.

As for BimX, I am having trouble finding the article I read just a few days ago, that was written by GS explaining that the forth coming BimX that that was introduced in Las Vegas this year, will be charged for "once the bugs are worked out".

If you are happy with current pricing and what it affords you, I am glad for you. But GS continues to put out an outdated library, that is lacking real world building products, components and FF&E. Virtually any major building product, finish, or component is available for Revit users, because vendors perceive that software as the best return on their investment. "Major" version upgrades of ArchiCAD continue to be released much later than the are announced to be released. Personally, I wish they would only come out every 2 years instead of every years, as the software seems to be constantly behind OS releases and plagued by trying to work out bugs catching up with the OS releases.

While it may seem obvious that "things" can cost more today than they did 10 years ago, do they really? Surely you have seen the speed of computers go up significantly in the last ten years, with cost holding steady or even decreasing. My first HP plotter in 1994, cost $13K. This week we will be installing a new Canon large format printer (no longer called plotters) for 1/3 the cost, getting 4x the printing speed, at least 300% better print quality, so no, not all things cost more today than they did 10 years ago.

Yet software development continues rise exponentially year after year, not unique to GS. Yet product/services from them all are barely evolutionary, not revolutionary....causing me to ask, why is pricing increasing at such a rapid pace without proportional added value.

Try raising your fees as an Architectural or Design Firm, at the rate software developers continue to reach deep into our pockets for software that never seems to be "finished"........let me know how that works out for you!

[Richard Morrison]

GS is hosting a free and very usable cloud server for Teamwork use on their own hardware for ALL users. That seems to be very generous to me. Otherwise you can use your own server at whatever your direct cost is. They also offer a larger scale server arrangement with many more features, which requires a separate key. This is really a separate service apart from the architectural software. I'm not sure what the current price/user is, but I'm guessing it is WAY less than the cost of the ArchiPlus subscription. I understand that you feel like they should be providing this full cloud Teamwork server within the price of the ArchiPlus subscription, but providing free server space was NEVER provided before, so they have not taken anything away from you and started charging for it. (ArchiPlus is optional, too.)

I believe the BIMx product you are referring to is the BIMx Lab app, which uses a different engine to display incredibly large projects quickly. I have not seen anything to suggest that this is going to change the current pricing structure of the mobile apps, which has a free version, and a paid enhanced version, when the new engine replaces the old.

Regarding outdated libraries, etc., I absolutely agree that these should be much better, but this is a different issue.

If you learn to use ArchiCAD well and complete your projects using improved technology in 1/2 your current time, you are essentially doubling your fee. (Assuming that you aren't foolishly charging by the hour -- in which case, you will be making 1/2 your fee. LOL)

[Geof Gainer]

I've always thought Archicad was expensive, but worth every penny. For me, a version upgrade for $500+ when I first started using it, to $800+ for the most recent one wasn't cheap, but far from unreasonable.

But changing BIMx pro to a subscription—and depriving the users of such a basic function as Favorites if they don't shell out fifty bucks a year—is the thing that really got to me. I've always been proud to be an Archicad user, to be part of that committed, hard-core, us-against-AutoCAD! elite with not only the best software in the market but the best company with the most dedicated community. Software and the community are still there, but the company all of a sudden feels a lot more like AutoDesk.

[RandyC]

Not much in version 24 for small firms , but you think they could at least update the "free" content for Archiplus subscribers --- they have a few items for "archiplus" available but they are only for V23 and below -- so what am I getting with my archiplus subscription ?

[Stress Co_]

Geof wrote:
But changing BIMx pro to a subscription—and depriving the users of such a basic function as Favorites if they don't shell out fifty bucks a year—is the thing that really got to me.

It's even more disappointing that, even with the paid subscription, Favorites have lost the ability to be quickly added by clicking the ⭐️ and every Favorite needs to be manually named. It doesn't automatically take the name of the Layout sheet, as it did before.
Weak.