Shift to a subscription model - your questions are welcome

[Akos Pfemeter]

Dear Community,

You may have already read the press release or the Insights post about our strategic shift to a subscription model. 

Here is a quick summary of the news:

BUDAPEST, April 2, 2024—Graphisoft, the leading Building Information Modeling (BIM) software solution developer for architecture and multidisciplinary design, today announced that, as part of its strategic shift to a sustainable subscription software delivery model, perpetual licenses will be gradually phased out by the end of 2025. This change does not affect the delivery of Software Service Agreement (SSA)/Forward subscription services to existing customers. 

Archicad perpetual and SSA/Forward licenses will be available for new customers through December 31, 2024, and to existing customers through December 31, 2025. Starting in 2026, Archicad will be available only through subscription. Active SSA/Forward contracts will continue to be serviced beyond 2025. Alternatively, SSA/Forward customers can convert to Archicad Collaborate subscriptions at the same price as SSA/Forward. This offer is designed to help existing SSA/Forward subscribers take full advantage of the Archicad Collaborate subscription, which combines award-winning Archicad for architectural design with BIMx and BIMcloud SaaS for fast, efficient, secure, real-time access to shared projects.

Please ask your questions and share your thoughts here -- Graphisoft's expert team will try and provide answer to all sorts of questions you may have!
Thank you.
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Edit by Moderator:  here is the link to the evolving information/FAQ page about this announcement:

https://graphisoft.com/convert-ssa-forward-to-archicad-collaborate/

[thesleepofreason]

And to make things even more messy: my SSA is with my local distributor and according to the terms it renews with 12 months December 31 if not terminated 6 months earlier - so my understanding is that to make a informed decision I need the relevant information from GS June 31 . BUT when looking at the GS account page (yet another mess) it lists licence with active SSA expiring April 30....

And yes - GS will have one case in each chapter!

[Martin Jules]

Taxability might be a factor of price increase after the first three years. Both SaaS and cloud computing are subject to sales and use tax in approximately twenty states in the United States. That could be my case to whom the Software Service Agreement (SSA) is governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In that state, SaaS, cloud computing, and electronically downloaded software are all taxable while the SSA is not. If I accept the conversion, my price will certainly be increased considerably after the discount period because of the sales tax and any other factors.  

[Martin Jules]

In addition to my bills for internet services no matter where I have to work. 

[mthd]

Hi, to all fellow users of this software. Most of us were aware of the changes coming in the near future. It’s here now so it is good for us to just accept it and move on if at all possible ? Either keep using this software if it suits your business model or change to something else if that would be better for your particular office.

It’s the old adage of monopoly and or tweaking the dollars to get more revenue or income. I am in the position of a solo practitioner so it certainly pains me to be forced into a subscription model from 2026 onwards.

This subscription only policy forces all market sharers to improve their product and in effect say “Pick me pick me”. As we know the parent company holds a few architectural software programs so that will have an effect on the future quality of the software that they hold.

It could open a hole in the market for another smart CAD/BIM solution to become perpetual only and swallow up a large market share ? Yet to be seen but anything is possible, unless this new company is bought out by the bigger one and is also forced into sub only. It’s all about Monopoly for them as it is for many other companies today.

Personally I am over it and I am not going to waste my valuable time rating and raving anymore about inevitable changes and inevitable consequences. This software is good and was once perpetual and now it’s not. So if we use it or not, or use a few of the others CAD/BIM softwares out there, we are not locked into one or the other from now on.

Let’s get back to designing great buildings with whatever software we choose to use.

Edited: If the CEO of Nemetscheck wanted to fully compete against Autodesk, they would in effect offer all their software services for either perpetual or subscription. Give the customer freedom of choice and see how much of the CAD/BIM market they can cater for. It doesn’t make sense to go just subscription only like the US market has. 

[vlahtinen]

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@mthd wrote:

This software is good

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Here, I disagree, and this is my biggest problem with the licensing change. In my opinion, Archicad is not a good piece of software, and I don't feel that we're getting value for the amount we have to pay with the subscription.

The UI is very inconsistent and not user-friendly; there are multiple bugs, and very often, the features released are half-baked and then not developed further anymore, just to name a few problems.

I'd be happy to pay the subscription price if it would give me high-quality software with new useful features every now and then. However, this is not currently the case.

[mthd]

Hi @vlahtinen, did you notice that I said “good”, good from my perspective or my opinion ? I am not a high end user by any means. It is certainly good for my business model at present while it still remains perpetual up the end of 2025. After that I will reassess my options like many others will also do.

[vlahtinen]

Hi, @mthd, yes I did. My intention was not to diminish your opinion. I'm sure that Archicad works well for some and that's great. My reply should have been a separate message and not a reply to your message in order to get my point across better. I wanted to explain why the change is bugging me and that's the value for money we're getting.

[Lee Hankins]

We’ve been on perpetual licensing for over 25 years and we’re getting really good rate due to the length of time we had been using Archicad. We were advised, and as expected, that this rate would be significantly increasing to bring us in line with the most up-to-date cost over several years of renewals. This process is still ongoing so it’s come as a bit of a shock that the perpetual is being ditched. 

Our biggest concerns are the cost increase to the business. On the face of it, it seems that the costs are going to triple to an extortionate amount (but still quite a bit cheaper than the competitor). We currently host our own BIMcloud due to not only the additional cost of BIMcloud SAAS but also an unreliable internet connection. I understand BIMcloudSAAS has clever technology to reduce bandwidth but that’s no good where there is non connection at all. At least in house we can carry on as normal. 

As many people have mentioned, the perpetual licensing model was one of the big advantages of Archicad over other more ‘popular’ packages and had the potential to draw people away from those alternatives. 

I’m a massive advocate for Archicad and will big it up to anyone who will listen but I really fear this could be very damaging.

[Andy Thomson]

During the business case modelling of these changes, I suspect Graphisoft has considered the sustainable revenue stream of this approach without considering the deleterious effect on the goodwill among the longtime user base. Many people will simply not renew, and look for lower cost solutions. One must also consider that there are emergent solutions that show great promise, some, based on legacy surface modellers, and many others that are writing new, agile code from scratch. If GS wishes to remain competitive in this context, I can only think it may be time to invest in a new product offering at a lower price point that can compete with all of these startups, otherwise it may lose many customers to them without its own competing offering. I will also add that ArchiCad is not on the computers of any Architecture school in Canada - despite my own active efforts to make this happen. When graduates emerge never having heard of ArchiCad - why would they even think to explore it? GS 'passively' maintaining an educational program without actually *actively* engaging with cash-strapped Universities to provide site-wide licenses and educational content (a boon to struggling profs) content is a huge missed opportunity towards developing the global user base it wishes to sell-to in the future - this could and should be a full-time job position at GSNA but I digress. This is what happens when the business leadership is out of touch with the market, and the way students become professionals without ever having touched or even heard of ArchiCad. I can only hope GS has a few more tricks up it’s sleeves, but after 3 decades, I'm not holding my breath.

One last thing to consider: many users have spent 5, 10, 20+ years developing content within the ArchiCad 'ecosystem', from GDL objects, to templates and workflows, etc. This user-generated content represents the proprietary intellectual property of these respective firms. When GS makes decisions about changing the relationship with its customers in these drastic ways, businesses are forced to reckon with the aspect of their IP becoming orphaned, as it may or may not readily translate to other platforms. So when GS undertakes its economic modelling, AC-based firms also need to do their own, and consider the substantial investment they have made in ArchiCad. When that investment is charged new premiums with no commensurate increase in value or productivity for the firms, hard decisions need to be made about exit strategies. I would urge Graphisoft to more carefully consider the relationship to its existing customers - since unilateral decisions like this one in particular could lead to very unpleasant consequences for both parties. 

[Martin Jules]

I am not going to subscribe to that just to support such annual releases: 

[Jp1138]

I don´t think they haven´t considered the user base. They must have calculated and think that the rise in income from the medium-large firms they are targeting now should be greater than the loss of all long time user base of small buissiness than won´t follow along...

[DGSketcher]

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@Akos Pfemeter wrote:

Please ask your questions and share your thoughts here -- Graphisoft's expert team will try and provide answer to all sorts of questions you may have!
Thank you.

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48 posts and not a sign of Graphisoft's expert team... 🙄 The subscription blow back may be worse than they expected, but the lack of response to any of the technical questions makes me wonder if they even have a plan for this subscription strategy to work.

[Karl Ottenstein]

@DGSketcher  - many probably also feel as you do, but perhaps have not worked in a corporate environment (I have in another life) ... where things move quite slowly... having to coordinate a meeting time with all other managers, get the coffee made, the pastries delivered ... then talk in circles for hours only to schedule a follow-up meeting.   Rinse and repeat.

I'm sure there will be a response, but I'm not necessarily expecting it this week. 🤔

[MinhNguyen]

Agree, I’m waiting for quality answers regardless of how long it take, rather than thoughtless ones that serves nobody

[DGSketcher]

@Karl Ottenstein - I take your point, BUT the Collaborate option isn't new, it's been around for a year** and I assume Tech Support have already been dealing with the associated issues and have answers. So why drop such an important post and not have a response team ready to react immediately & stop things running out of control?

As @Bricklyne Clarence has indicated this is pretty much standard fare for Graphisoft... post & run. 

** https://community.graphisoft.com/t5/Graphisoft-Insights/Start-strong-with-Archicad-Collaborate/ba-p/...

[Bricklyne Clarence]

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@DGSketcher wrote:

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48 posts and not a sign of Graphisoft's expert team... 🙄 The subscription blow back may be worse than they expected, but the lack of response to any of the technical questions makes me wonder if they even have a plan for this subscription strategy to work.

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I was wondering how long it would be before someone noticed that.

And contrary to what someone else said that this is the (slow) pace at which responses take to get delivered in these kinds of threads, I would hasten to point out that actually, this whole "post a topic and then offer to answer questions and then never show up again, or show up briefly until the responses and frustration become too much before disappearing again permantently this time" routine has become the standard method of customer relation and user interactionfrom Graphisoft folks on these boards in the post-"Letter" era after they pledged to do better in communicating with users.

You can take a look at any of the other threads that THEY started with the same premise that they were seeking feedback or looking to provide some answers and clarity only for the thread to get reduced to users talking back and forth amongst themselves and the Graphisoft person who started thread is never seen or heard from again in that thread.

The Roadmamp thread famously comes to mind. 

Any ETA on when we'll get answers on whether they'll ever implement user suggestions like a 'voting system' or more user-intaractivity, or answers to the question of the flexibility and mobility on the various items in the different parts of that Roadmap?

Several months on and we're still waiting.

It was a similar situation with a thread started by a user voicing frustration with their "pop-up" survey at the ArchiCAD launch or close session. At least in that case a GS person showed up (I guess the guy who thought it was a great idea in the first place), gave some answers that he was rightly informed were TERRIBLE answers, and then like clockwork, disappeared and was never seen from again (at least per the last time I took part in it. Admittedly it may have changed since then and they may have gotten more clarity).

And you could go on and on with other threads they start seemingly like they want to actually help or be helpful ir informative, only to disappear.

Look, I get it.

It can be tough dealing with people's (expected) frustrations and venting their complaints and anger at you.

But YOU (GS) created this situation in the first place with your lack of clarity and straightforwardness with your customers.......over several years, I might point out,.....and then plopping something like this news on us out of the blue (even though we knew it was coming), and in the wake of their less than satisfactorypast several version releases and responses with customer frustration with those.

You fostered this, so you can't act blindsided that you drop this news and you're met with a lot of anger and disappointment that leads you to not wanting to engage any further.

All it leads it is making all this just seem like yet another attempt at PR massaging and messaging in damage control to deal with the bad optics you've created rather than actually addressing serious issues and concerns and indeed very pertinent and relevant questions being raised that need answers.

People need clarity and answers that affect the decisions they're going to make in their firms and for their firms going forward - not another PR exercise in,..."let's make it look like we actually care that this is negatively impacting people but are trying to show how it's really for the benefit of all involved that we're doing this thing that we know will hurt more people than will actually help"....messaging.

We should be past that by now.

They wouldn't have started this thread if they didn't realize they had a PR headache to deal with and contain, and they certainly wouldn't have had some serious higher-up like,.... "VP Global Cross-Brand Sales"..... be the one to deliver the bad news.

Follow through and deal with the PR mess all the way through, and spare us the messaging and optics massaging and all that other stuff you all seem to excel at nowadays, at our expense and at the expense of the program and making it better,  if not less affordable.

[MASz]

I don't have too much to add beyond what everyone has said. The whole thing is just a convoluted and disturbing mess. My trust in Graphisoft has never been lower. The state of Archicad 27, my recent interactions with Graphisoft and now this. It's difficult to process.

Just on the topic of the updates: Graphisoft cannot even get yearly updates right, Archicad 27 is still a mess. And yet, they are also proposing to somehow change how updates work? Continuous updates and a built-in updater? Even the new CEO says "Shifting our product delivery model to subscription allows users to take advantage of agile, responsive, and up-to-date software solutions — as soon as they hit the market," What are they even talking about? As others have pointed out, it raises so many questions. I can't see any of this working unless this talk is all just nonsense marketing to try and justify all this.

[Miha_M]

Another serious question if no on-premise solution will be available in the future is the security aspect.

Not only in cases where projects are on a higher security level, but also considering the strange and changing conditions the world wide web has been facing in latest times, the SaaS approach is prone to failure, that's why another solution has to be available. Even with no working different localisation compatibility solution ready I guess cloud services will still be all Google Cloud latency dependent? We'll all have to rely on regular downloaded snapshots in case somewhere a natural or man-made disaster strikes, but on-premise collaborative work will be off the table all together?

[MinhNguyen]

Many here have raised concerns about subscription model being beneficial to big firms only. Well, I could turn the argument around and say: with the current "promotion", it's actually more beneficial for smaller firms who are on SSA contract and want to lock the price for the next 3-6 years, plus offset IT cost with SaaS. For bigger firms with hundreds of seats, who have already invested millions of dollars on perpetual AC and BIMcloud licenses, server infrastructure and equipment, they would hold on to perpetual for as long as possible. 

[Akos Pfemeter]

Dear Archicad Customers!

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and questions regarding Graphisoft’s recent announcement about transitioning our software delivery model in the coming years. Recognizing that this represents a significant change in our business operations, we have created an extensive FAQ page dedicated to addressing common topics and potential issues related to this change to provide further clarity:

https://graphisoft.com/convert-ssa-forward-to-archicad-collaborate/faq 

We thank you again for sharing your thoughts with us here and encourage you to keep posting your further comments. We will keep monitoring this thread and will continually update and extend the program’s FAQ page online.

Best regards

Your Graphisoft Team

[torben_wadlinger]

Perhaps it is time for the EU to intervene here. After all, the Nemetschek Group is a European company. We and our data are being held hostage. Subscription is not progress and does not benefit the user. It only ensures a steady flow of money into your coffers while we are tied to your product with our data.

Stop treating us like little children and don't try to sell us this crap as something in our interest. In the meantime, we are paying for a dysfunctional product. SHAME ON YOU! And stop taking us for fools.

I think I will write to my Member of the European Parliament. What worked with Microsoft will also work with Graphisoft.