Dear Norbert,
I apologize for taking so long to respond – this has been a holiday weekend in the USA, and I’ve been a bit preoccupied.
Thank you for your good words about Notation Composer, and we are so glad that you have found it to be useful for your musical pursuits. That is our main goal for our customers. I realize that that the price of an upgrade may seem like a little much given your previous purchase price.
I would like to briefly explain why the prices for version 3 were selected as such.
Notation Software offers the best notation transcription from MIDI files -better than any other product on the market. Neither the high end products nor any freeware products available can provide similar music sheet transcriptions like ours. Version 2 of the Notation Software product suite was launched in 2007 and continuously enhanced with new features. Customers could update over this long period of time, always for free. Those who purchased later in the product cycle of version 2 (like you) immediately benefited from those developments while not paying the equivalent of the significantly higher prices at the beginning of the product launch of version 2 in 2007.
After the passing of our founder, president, and CEO Mark Walsen (that full announcement is at
http://www.notation.com/vb-forum/showthread.php?t=3550 if you previously missed it) the shareholders of Notation Software, Inc. (the US company) looked for the best way for the company going forward in order to further support our customers from all over the world. At that point in time a significant development investment needed to be funded for the next business step. The US shareholders decided not to invest for that step because the key business and development driver (Mark Walsen) was not around anymore, and because the business did not justify the prices of software work in the neighbourhood of Microsoft in the Seattle area, US (very expensive). From the shareholders' perspective the best solution was that an existing customer of Notation Software, Inc. - Reinhold Hoffmann - should take over the risk and challenge to move the company forward. With a significant financial investment, the development of version 3 was started 2 years ago, even long before the announcement of the acquisition under German ownership was made.
As part of this acquisition a major cost restructuring also happened and was performed in parallel. The new company with its new shareholders decided to create a company setup which is long-term viable in order to continue the support of the terrific customer base all over the world. Serving all these customers is only possible with a financially viable company setup. Therefore, the current version 3 prices were agreed on by the new company’s shareholders to be (1) still significantly lower than those of the competition, (2) while also creating a new company setup which is financially long-term viable. This situation is best for all our interests.
I should also mention that for the features that Notation Composer has, our competition usually charges over twice the price for the initial purchase, and as much or more for upgrades. We really feel that we have still priced our software amiably both for our customers (to keep it affordable) and the company (to be able to continue development and support).
Furthermore, many thanks for your kind words on our forum. (I should also mention that the free-to-customers forum and the support desk both need to be funded from sold software licenses.)
So, the bottom line is that we are still working hard to provide the best quality software at an affordable price. In order to continue as a viable company, we do have to charge for the software because it does take time and effort to maintain it, support it, and continue to develop it to improve it even more.
I hope that the above history and explanation help you and others to understand the situation. Anyone can explore their options and pricing for an upgrade by visiting the Upgrade Assistant at
www.notation.com/UpgradeOrder.php
Thanks again for your kind note, and we hope that you continue to enjoy making music with your Notation Software product.
All the best to you,
Sherry