Microsoft extends product support to 10 years

IDG News Service - Microsoft Corp. next month will institute a new product life-cycle policy that extends support for Microsoft products to a minimum of 10 years from the current seven years. The updated policy also provides increased support for IT infrastructure security assistance, Microsoft said at its Tech Ed conference in San Diego.
The announcement, in a keynote presentation by Microsoft Corporate Vice President Andy Lees, was welcomed with applause by the audience.
Microsoft currently offers five years of mainstream support and two years of extended support. Under the new policy, which starts June 1, customers will still get at least five years of mainstream support after the date a product ships, but the support period now automatically extends for two years after the next version of the product ships. This could result in more than five years of mainstream support.
Under the new policy, after mainstream supports ends, Microsoft will provide extended support for five years or for two years after the second successor product ships, whichever results in the longest support period, the company said. By "second successor" Microsoft refers to the second major upgrade of the product.
"This is designed so that we never have less than two years for a customer to migrate to the next version," said Peter Houston, a senior director at Microsoft. "Customers can now predict in advance how long they are going to get support even if they don't know when the next product is coming out.
"With something like SQL Server 2005, the challenge was that without this updated policy, mainstream support for SQL Server 2000 might have ended before customers were able to migrate," he said.
Microsoft's SQL Server 2005 database product is due out in the first half of next year. Mainstream support for the current SQL Server 2000 software was set to end on Dec. 31, 2005, potentially giving customers only months to upgrade before the end of mainstream support.
Mainstream support includes all the support options and programs Microsoft offers, such as no-charge incident support, paid incident support, support charged on an hourly basis, support for warranty claims and hot-fix support.
In the extended support period, Microsoft still offers all paid support options and security fixes but won't accept requests for warranty support, design changes or new features. Also, hot-fix support not related to security issues requires a separate Extended Hotfix Support contract.
The updated support life-cycle policy is valid for Microsoft's business and developer products that are currently in the mainstream support phase as well as future products, the