For Immediate Release
4D, Inc. Announces New Pricing Model on 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V for Mac OS X
— Frequent Updates for WebSTAR Community Central Members in New
Pricing Structure with Lower Overall Cost of Ownership —
SAN JOSE, Calif., October 9, 2001 — 4D, Inc., publishers of the 4th
Dimension RAD/RDBMS Environment and 4D WebSTAR Server Suite, today
announced a new pricing structure for 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V with
frequent updates for WebSTAR Community Central members, and outlined the
first 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V update already under development.
4D, Inc. today shipped 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V (see related release,
dated today) under the new pricing and software update release structure
designed to provide the user with frequent updates, quality support and a
lower cost of ownership than ever before. 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V is
available today directly from (http://www.webstar.com/) for an initial
license fee of $399, which includes updates and support for one year, with
additional support and updates provided for members of WebSTAR Community
Central at a rate of $179 per year. A pricing backgrounder document on the
new pricing structure is posted at:
http://www.webstar.com/products/productfaq.html#pricing.
“4D, Inc.’s commitment is to high quality, both in terms of up-to-date code
and quality support,” explained Brendan Coveney, president and CEO, 4D,
Inc. “Our new pricing structure starts lower and results in a lower cost of
ownership even after several years of membership in WebSTAR Community
Central. Under the new Continuous Improvement Program, we’re already
working on our first update and look forward to community feedback about
feature priorities.”
“4D is the first packaged application to adopt a license-plus-subscription
model which delivers continuous improvement of software and continuous
support,” said Vernon Keenan, Internet industry analyst. “4D’s self-help
community interaction, support features and new Continuous Improvement
Program enhances 4D’s core values, stimulates demand, and delivers economic
value to their users.”
Unrenewed licenses will not expire, however they also will not accept
important updates from 4D, Inc. or third-party vendors. New licenses of 4D
WebSTAR V are offered to academic institutions for an educational price of
$299, with upgrades at the same price for the general public. Upgrades are
available at $199 for current registered users of WebSTAR v4.x, and $299
for current registered users of WebSTAR v3.x. Cross-grades are available by
calling the sales department at 4D, Inc. All upgrades and cross-grades come
with one year of support and software updates, which is renewable for a
$179/year membership in WebSTAR Community Central.
First Update Already Under Development
In an effort to issue frequent updates to 4D WebSTAR Server Suite V, the
first update is already under development, and will include performance
tuning, localization for several additional languages and much more. User
feedback will also impact final features in the first update, which is
scheduled to ship in the upcoming weeks. Blue World and 4D, Inc. plan to
include an update to WebSTAR Lasso Publisher in a future update to 4D
WebSTAR Server Suite V, based on Blue World’s forthcoming Lasso
Professional 5.
“We’ve refined our build process so extensively, we can now deliver new
releases more frequently than users can stand to receive them,” explained
CJ Holmes, chief WebSTAR engineer, 4D, Inc. “We’re also developing a new
Update Notification feature in the Admin Client that tells our customers
when updates are available, how important we feel each updated component
is, and what the changes are from the previous version. These are just some
of the things we’re doing to get improvements and fixes into the hands of
customers as quickly as possible, and all of this effort stems directly
from our new licensing model.”
About 4D, Inc.
Located in San Jose, California, 4D Inc. is the US distributor of 4th
Dimension and the 4D family of products, which has set the relational
database standard for over fifteen years. 4D Inc., formerly ACI US, Inc.,
publishes a tightly integrated suite of professional, cross-platform
Web-embedded development tools. 4D Inc is a 100 percent owned subsidiary of
4D SA, formerly ACI SA. StarNine Technologies is a 100 percent subsidiary
of 4D, Inc. StarNine publishes the award winning 4D WebSTAR Server Suite, a
complete set of four high-performance servers in one easy-to-use
application.
The URL for our new location on the Web is: http://www.4D.com/