Last year, Safe Software rolled out new pricing plans for FME licenses and annual maintenance fees. In return, the new subscription-based acquisition model gives clients the freedom to choose and pay for only what they need, ensuring tailored solutions that align with their specific requirements.
The annual FME Enterprise Subscription is priced based on either one of these variables:
- The value of already acquired licenses
- The estimated value of the licenses to be deployed
- The size of the organization, as measured by criteria such as population or the number of students, passengers, etc.
Hardly a week goes by without an FME client asking whether they should switch to a subscription. Here are the top five reasons it’s a smart move.
1. A simpler acquisition process and fewer costs
Although acquisition processes can be simple, more often than not they’re complex operations. But one thing is certain: an acquisition process always comes with a hefty management cost. And that’s even before you consider the administrative time users must often allocate to create the needs and/or opportunity analyses required to acquire new licenses over time.
Unfortunately, we’ve seen so many projects abandoned because users just did not have the time to set up these analyses. Another reason projects are abandoned is because the acquisition wasn’t done fast enough to meet delivery requirements.
With a subscription agreement, you can create a multi-year contract based on anticipated use, so you only have to do the administrative work once. Then all your team has to do is focus on deploying FME technology to support your organization’s performance needs. Voilà!
2. Accelerate the adoption curve
Before subscriptions were an option, FME adoption rates hinged greatly on our clients’ capacity to obtain budgets for migrating to FME Flow or acquiring additional FME Form licenses. We even saw clients who had to create scheduled tasks in Windows as a makeshift way to run their workspaces while they waited for approval to get FME Flow.
We’ve come a long way, and subscriptions are now a great way to accelerate the adoption curve. Most clients who are planning to implement FME using Consortech’s performance kits have negotiated a multi-year subscription agreement with an initial term of three to five years.
They can start rolling out FME Flow as soon as they like, get more FME Flow engines if they need more power, and add new FME Form licenses when a new employee comes onboard or when a new department requests one.
3. Reduce initial acquisition costs
Especially for new clients, an FME subscription is a way to pay only for what they need on an annual basis, rather than make a large initial investment in permanent licenses. This can be a particularly attractive option for smaller towns, thanks to population-based pricing.
Meanwhile, existing clients can reduce upfront investments and have immediate access to licenses, such as for FME Flow, or additional engines for specific projects.
4. Help IT departments go low-code
Many GIS and, particularly, IT departments, are highly dependent on time, money and access to a solid team of developers. But many IT managers want to break out of this paradigm and are now feeling confident to move toward low-code solutions.
Gartner recently predicted that worldwide low-code use will go up by 20%—a strong trend that shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, more and more of our clients are now using FME Flow as an enterprise GIS data integration platform.
5. Process data in real time
Organizations have to deal with an increasing amount of data, especially real-time or near real-time data. This data can come from static IoT sensors, vehicle tracking applications, regular input from field teams or just via the regular exchange of information between applications such as Cityworks and ArcGIS.
No matter where these data flows come from, or whether you’re connecting via an API or webhooks, processing this data requires investing in technology, such as:
- Acquiring a first instance of FME Flow
- Adding dedicated FME Flow engines for specific processing operations
- Setting up FME Flow test and development environments
FME Enterprise Subscription or perpetual licenses: The choice is yours
Despite recent price increases, FME licenses remain relatively affordable compared to other ETL solutions and data integration platforms on the market— especially since no one wants to go back after experiencing the undeniable time and productivity gains of FME’s low-code approach!
Like our partner Safe Software, we are committed to providing our clients with exceptional value and flexibility. That’s why you have several license acquisition options tailored to your specific needs.
If you are planning to implement a structured implementation of FME in your organization, we strongly recommend considering a subscription. An FME Enterprise Subscription provides the flexibility to accommodate more users and the adaptability needed to handle increasing data processing demands. Just think of all the time and money a subscription can save you!