AutoDesk licensing changes in 2020

More Autodesk licensing changes are coming. As part of their long-term strategy to change the buying habits of their customers, and shift them to software subscriptions, AutoDesk have announced further changes to their product line-up, pricing, and promotions.

Maintenance and subscriptions

Maintenance trade-in

As of May 7, 2020, maintenance customers have 2 choices:

• Stay on maintenance and agree to a 20% price increase
• Switch to subscription at current maintenance price

AutoDesk have stated if customers don’t take the current trade-in offer, no updates will be available from May 7, 2021 when maintenance plans will be retired.

Multi-user subscription trade-in

AutoDesk are also making changes to their subscription line-up and removing multi-user subscriptions, in favour of named user subscriptions.

• Multi-year multi-user subscriptions are no longer available and, as of February 2020, cannot be renewed.
• Single-year multi-user subscriptions will no longer be sold after May 7, 2020 – with renewals ending May 7, 2021.

From May 7, 2020 at a customer’s first renewal, each multi-user subscription* can be traded in for 2 x named user subscriptions. If an organisation chooses not to make this change at their first renewal, the offer at their second renewal will be to trade in for 1 x named user subscriptions. It is expected this will impact approximately 20% of the AutoDesk customer base.

*Coronavirus update to Autodesk licensing changes*
Autodesk have announced that multi-user subscriptions will continue to be sold until August 7, 2020 as they “do not want to introduce a change at a time when business-as-usual is hard enough”.

Price Increases

February 2020
New multi-user subscriptions are priced at 2 x named user pricing, which represents a 14-33% increase. BIM 360 Docs & Build also increase 15%.

March 2020
New named-user subscriptions for most products will increase by 5%.

New license line-up

AutoDesk licensing will soon have the following variants:

• Standard
• Premium
• Enterprise

Standard is aimed at “individuals and small businesses” while Premium is for “larger businesses” looking for more advanced “admin tools, security, and…reporting”; Premium will also feature SSO capabilities and a higher level of support.

Further Reading

Licensing FAQ: https://www.autodesk.com/campaigns/transition-to-named-user/terms-and-conditions