What's up with m-files licensing

If you have perpetual licenses M-Files will not stop working. You just won't be able to install updates released after the expiry date.
The M-Files renewals team seems to be heavily overloaded at the moment. I'm sure they do their best but they are not on top of things right now. I guess they have to give priority to customers on M-Files Online subscription. For those users M-Files will stop working when the license expires.
So if you have perpetual licenses then please be patient, if you have subscription based licenses then please contact your reseller to make sure you get a renewal before expiry.

They had a similar issue at the beginning of the year. I can understand a "one-off" issue but for this to reoccur is quite worrying to be honest.

Of note is also the fact that perpetual licenses will be in fact "deperpetualized" as the company is pivoting toward a much-pricier subscription-only model.

I would have thought that this might ignite more debate but I guess people here have deep pockets... :)

Hi,

@SteveV: If you are concerned when I suggest you raise this immediately with your reseller or Channel Account Manager (basically: whoever you bought M-Files through). If the server licence does expire in ~10 days then you will need to apply a new one, and it will need to be generated by M-Files. This can take a few days so it's best to get the process started.

Just to clarify: we are not "deperpetualising" any licences. M-Files previously offered licensing models for both "perpetual" and "subscription", with the "subscription" model requiring less capital expenditure from customers and providing them with additional flexibility. M-Files is no longer selling perpetual licences, but we are not doing anything to affect customers who already have valid perpetual licences; you can continue to use your software within the existing licensing terms. Of course, over time, new features or functionality may only appear in our subscription "M-Files Online" program (not to be confused with our cloud offering) and perpetual licensees may not gain access to these. But I am unaware of any plans to "deperpetualise" any existing licence or to adversely impact existing support and maintenance contracts.

If you have concerns or queries then please do speak to your Channel Account Manager or reseller. If your questions aren't answered by the official information that we have already published then I am sure that our Product Marketing department would be happy to answer them separately.

Regards,

Craig.

Well, I'm afraid I will disagree with you here.

My understanding is that you are going to stop the support of non-subscription version of M-file by the end of next year. For most of my clients, M-Files is an absolute core tool that we can not leave unsupported. Imagine a Windows Update that breaks something in M-Files. If the product is unsupported, we are pretty much screwed.

The subscription model is acceptable as long as you have a choice. Microsoft, Adobe, etc have all pivoted to it but they still also provide the possibility to purchase you applications and support for them. Again, for a product as strategic as M-Files, we simply cannot accept the notion of the publisher "pulling the plug" at any time for whatever reason they might feel like. Some of my customers have tasked me to find a replacement for that very reason - on principle (BTW if anyone wants to chime in with suggestions be my guest !).

Now don't get me wrong. I still love the product. I understand that you - or more likely your VC backers - want to milk the cow. That's unfortunately standard practice nowadays. But make sure you don't shoot yourselves in the foot in so doing.

A suggestion if I might: maybe it would be time for a M-Files "light" or "core". Something with the feature set of, say, v2018 (or even earlier than that), offered as a standalone, supported (if not developed) product. I'm sure there would be a market for it.

PS: Yes I have voiced there concerns with my reseller and I'm sure that they passed the message.
PPS: Yes the reoccurrence of the license management issues is worrying