Nortel Networks Monday at the Global Connect 2004 users' group conference in Los Angeles introduced a software upgrade program that solution providers can use to help customers move to new converged telephony platforms.
The Preferred Software Membership program, which will be available to customers exclusively through Nortel channel partners, gives customers a predetermined, fixed, per-user rate for upgrading to future releases of the vendor's Succession IP call server software.
Available for periods of one, two or three years, the program enables solution providers to offer multiyear software maintenance contracts while helping customers budget more effectively for upgrades, said Christine Durham, vice president of market and channel outreach at Nortel, during an interview at Global Connect, an annual conference sponsored by the International Nortel Networks Users Association (INNUA).
"[Customers] know every year what they have to set aside," Durham said.
This contrasts with the more common method of disclosing upgrade prices at the time a new release is available, which for many customers comes after budgets for the year have been set.
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