Wednesday 11 April 2012

Leaking TeamMentor's Pricing model

Last week I was with Ed Adams (Security Innovation CEO) while he was in the UK to meet some TeamMentor customers, and I commented how it really sucks when a tool vendor doesn't give you a strait answer when you ask them the simple question: '...so... how much does your tool costs?' 

And they usually reply '...well, that depends on this, ... and on that,  ... and on how many users, .. blah ... blah... blah...  and if it is yellow, .. and on how much support is needed , blah.. blah... blah .. and if it needs to sign in tune ... blah... blah...blah...and if it actually needs to work ... blah ... blah...blah...'  (and after 5 minutes you still have no idea how much it costs)

I'm sure you have heard those lines before :)

It basically means that they trying to figure out before they give you a price: a) how big you are, and b)  how much money you have to spend

This is just wrong!

Customers need to be treated with respect, and pricing must be clear, consistent and easy to understand.

So as Ed was agreeing with me, I gently noted that we didn't put our current pricing model for TeamMentor (TM) on the Security Innovation (SI) website :)

And please note, the SI team is really good ! The politics level is very low, and they are a pleasure to work with. But when everybody is doing it (not disclosing prices) it is hard to be the first one.

So let me see if I can help :)

And the end of our conversation, I said "... you know Ed ...  I really want to leak TeamMentor pricing model  ... and once it is out there ... it is out there ...."  :)

And (actually not to my surprise, since Ed is really relax in these things), Ed just said "...ok, do it.."

So, here it is: (get ready for an anti-climax moment)    

TeamMentor pricing model is:
  • 40k USD  - Unlimited (per business unit) TM Server Installs + SI Library (with 4000 Articles) +  dedicated GitHub Fork (which we will maintain) , 
  • 10k USD  - 1x  TM  Server Licence + SI Library + dedicated GitHub Fork
  • 0k USD    - 1x  TM  Server License + OWASP Library + shared GitHub download (this is our 'evaluation' version and comes with a 'not for commercial use' license)
There are a couple TeamMentor related Services that we will be providing ( 'Policy document to TeamMentor Library' conversion, 'TeamMentor in the Cloud', TeamMentor customizations, etc...), and there is also a reseller agreement, with a 20% to 40% commission.

In a way, one of the value propositions of TeamMentor, is that it is more expensive to pay somebody to write 'specialized application security' content, than it is to buy TeamMentor's Library.

And that' it :)

Disclamer: I did forward this email internally at SI (as a sign of respect and to made sure that I didn't get any details massively wrong), and apart for the strike-through 'a 20% to' (just above) there were no further changes. One comment that Adam (VP of sales) made  was "... well I do wish that they contact me directly if they want to talk about pricing..", so to make Adam happy, here are his contact details: ahoffman@securityinnovation.com  +1 (978)337-1810