Can you announce your intended pricing and what features you will have? I saw that you stated less than $500 for the enterprise edition. I can guess that it will be $495 then... and it makes me worried.

My opinion is that you must justify a 500 % price increase very very much. I have thrown out several component-manufacturers because they decided to raise the pricing to crazy levels.

I would say that $199 is great, $299 would probably be ok but not higher than that. A $99 or $149 upgrade price for existing user would be very reasonable.

Hope you consider my opinion. /Fredrik.

Enterprise edition costs so much because it has sources. If you don't need them, Pro edition will be great, it's price will be about $250.
I'm looking at our competitors' prices. Noone have a "$99 product".

I think he is right. You will have problems selling it with source for more than 299$ if you want many customers.

And very few serious developers buy components without sources. So the other options is not there.

But I don't know exatly how mutch you get with FR3 and how stable it is, so I might be wrong.

I personally think this pricing structure is over the top considering that
you can currently purchase v2.52 for $99 (which includes run-time designer, scripts, dialog forms and sources) or you can "upgrade" (I use the term upgrade lightly) to v3 which will have "no run-time designer, no scripts, no dialog forms, no sources (users of FR2.x get this version for free)". Or you can buy the 'proper' upgrade for around $500!

While I appreciate all the extra work you have done for this new version (as you have said it has been rewritten), I think it is unfair to charge existing customers nearly $500 each for what was your choice in doing a complete rewrite which ultimately will make your life easier regards support or adding new features.

From what I can gather the MAIN ADDITION to the actual core is HTML support. All others are IMPROVEMENTS (like better WYSIWYG, better Dot Matrix support, better Scripting) - this is all stuff that I've already worked around or doesn't bother me that much.

You have set a precedent by charging $99 for an excellent reporting tool that compares well with others like Rave. By charging such a low price, you get/have got the volume of users but by increasing the price, FastReport will blend into the background along with other reporting tools. Budget price = lots of users!

In short, at its current price ($99) it represents excellent value for money and I wouldn't hesitate in recommending it to any other developer but if the price is hiked by 500% I have serious misgivings.

Regards,
Azza

I've little bit confused with prices. I meant Server edition when talking about 'less than $500' price. Current prices/features are:

$99 - Basic Edition
no sources, no run-time designer, no scripts, no dialog forms

$179 - Standard
no sources, no run-time designer

$249 - Professional
no sources

$349 - Enterprise
full source code

$449 - Server
same as Enterprise + report server components

Prices will be reduced by $99 for registered users of FR2.x and by $79 for registered users of FastScript.

Ok. Then the right increase would be 350%..

Because 2.52 has sources, run-time designer, scripts and dialog forms. That would mean that v.3 should be 3,5 times better than 2.52. And that would mean that we should have an extreme amount of new possibilites then? I don't belive that the new version can be that good. And since this is the first completely rewritten version, there are going to be a good amount of bugs surfacing at least the first year out in the field.

It is more than 3.5 times better. Most of bugs are catched during the alpha testing, I hope remained ones will be catched in betas.

[QUOTE]It is more than 3.5 times better. Most of bugs are catched during the alpha testing, I hope remained ones will be catched in betas.


For that we have to wait and see if that's true.

Still, I don't think many existing customer will upgrade to FR3.0 with this pricelevel.

I will certainly don't.

Hmmm, I wouldn't mention QuickReport 4 if I were you Alex; it comes (albeit without sources) free with Delphi! *but* even though it comes free with Delphi, peple have still purchased your product as it was well supported and cheap (with sources).

Yes, and how many people do you know that uses QR4

I would say noone. And if anyone do, it's because they have done no research on the net, and had QR before. Everyone who uses FR does research on the net.

But I agree that it can't cost 99$ anymore. But 349$ is to mutch of a lift, if you want a bigger amount of customers. 249$ with all sources, and 199$ for registered users of 2.5 would be better. If you get 1000 customers with a price of 249$ and 100 customers with a price of 349$, what would you choose?

Well, I know peoples who use Rave or ReportBuilder. Look at their prices...

>>Well, I know peoples who use Rave or ReportBuilder. Look at their prices...

I think we should think the price's inscape, the support should have some percentage, but fr's support....

And the source to developer's effect, Much is a guaranty, there is no other mean or actual function, so the add price is too much!

Not lower your prices will throw you out of this market.
Believe us Alex !

Ouch on the price increase!!! I was expecting perhaps $99 or $199 upgrade price based on features expected. I think you have a good market space and should reconsider your pricing a bit.

Here are some ideas that I could live with.

Here are some ideas on DCU only pricing
$79 for basic with no R/T editing. STd
$99 w R/T editing, Pro
$199 for Enterprise.

Source access could be priced per year at an additional $99 for Pro and $149 for Ent.

Exisitng FR 2.x users should have opportunity to get upgrade for like features for

(source lice for 1yr and DCU for basic point upgrades)
Pro w/source $99
Ent w/source for $149

Please consider that you may be pricing your product out of reach and your only other competitor pricewise is ReportManager which is free. I have tried RM and I continue to use FR 100% of the time. I just finished converting my last app from using Crystal reports to FR and my clients are very happy.

i think fastreports price is correct, and its fare.


but dot-matrix support must be better.