Contract Advice
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
I personally have to agree with avoiding the Per Seat/Per Site license. The fact of the matter is you are no where big enough to enforce it. Your best bet is to set a price and sell software maintenance. Charge something around 18%-20% of the cost as a yearly fee for keeping the software up to date. Your money will come from custom modifications and the maintenance agreements.
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I personally have to agree with avoiding the Per Seat/Per Site license. The fact of the matter is you are no where big enough to enforce it. Your best bet is to set a price and sell software maintenance. Charge something around 18%-20% of the cost as a yearly fee for keeping the software up to date. Your money will come from custom modifications and the maintenance agreements.
I have to disagree. So, whether they have the system installed on 5 machines or 50,000 machines, charge the same? The fact is, this is a medical enviornment and they will demand top notch support. Every PC with an installation represents another potential point of failure and another possible support case. Give Armadillo a good hard look. With it, you can enforce hardware ID registration so that individual copies can only be installed on a single PC. The professional version can regulate the number of simultaenous instances running on a single network. For a couple hundred dollars, you can feel fairly secure that your intellectual property is protected. If you don't like Armadillo, there are several other protection systems out there. You CAN regulate the number of licenses in an office setting with an appropriate software protection package. Don't undercut yourself! Make sure that if you could end spending a couple hundred extra hours on this product that when its all said and done, that you weren't working for $6.50 an hour. Jim QTExtender - The OFFICIAL addon for QuoteTracker.
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
Judd wrote: this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around You've GOT to be joking... you're talking about the UK NHS right???? The one that can't find __enough__ reasons to spend money on IT projects!!!!??!!?!?! As an NI payer I say go high! :-D ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Shaun Austin: .NET Specialist. Spreading the word of .NET to the world... well the UK... well my tiny corner of it!! :-D
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
Thanks all for the relpys. I may have misrepresented this a little - I wouldn't be selling this to the NHS, but to an (singular) NHS hospital lab, at present as a research interest (on a research budget). I thought about selling it with a very limited support caveat (i.e., they don't get any - to be honest the thing is so small that there isn't much that could go wrong with it!). I could always include an 'additional works' clause, as suggested at £x/hr. Having said that, I did spend a fair few hours doing it - I even did a help file and install package... Hmmm...
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
Well Judd, as everytbody here seemes to disagree on the fine print I will have to give my own share of disagreement.:) As ther is only one buyer, a small lab, I think you should not give to much attention to any "rule-of-thumb". It all depends on what sort of relation (if any) you want to maintain with them. Here are a few questions you could ask yourself: Do you want to give support, or just grab the cash and run? Perhaps they want more functionality? Do you want to sell this to other similar labs? I don´t think a per license scheme is good. As far as I can see from your post this will only be useful on a handful of machines. And very few people have any use for the software. So why not keep things simple? One time payment. And counting # of hrs x # number of money (as someone suggested) seems silly if you do an "as is" deal. (Customisation is different) They never ordered this from you. They have seen it. They like it. You should try a bit of clever psychology and fox them into giving you an idea of what thay can afford. After all your girl knows them well. In the end it comes down to: how much money would you feel good about? Still an EULA is a must. That way you maintain some control of what happens with your rights. methinx Adam _____________________________________ Action without thought is not action Action without emotion is not life
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Well Judd, as everytbody here seemes to disagree on the fine print I will have to give my own share of disagreement.:) As ther is only one buyer, a small lab, I think you should not give to much attention to any "rule-of-thumb". It all depends on what sort of relation (if any) you want to maintain with them. Here are a few questions you could ask yourself: Do you want to give support, or just grab the cash and run? Perhaps they want more functionality? Do you want to sell this to other similar labs? I don´t think a per license scheme is good. As far as I can see from your post this will only be useful on a handful of machines. And very few people have any use for the software. So why not keep things simple? One time payment. And counting # of hrs x # number of money (as someone suggested) seems silly if you do an "as is" deal. (Customisation is different) They never ordered this from you. They have seen it. They like it. You should try a bit of clever psychology and fox them into giving you an idea of what thay can afford. After all your girl knows them well. In the end it comes down to: how much money would you feel good about? Still an EULA is a must. That way you maintain some control of what happens with your rights. methinx Adam _____________________________________ Action without thought is not action Action without emotion is not life
Adam, I am starting to think that a one time payment would be best, but with a open clause for further work as a 'to be discussed' item, if they want it to do anything more than it does currently. My contact did give me a figure that he considered too high - and to be honest, given the functionality of the utility and time I spent doing it, I tend to agree with him! I was more interested, I suppose, in the (quasi-)legal bits and pieces - limited liability clauses and such. I'll have to come up with some kind of EULA...and think about how much is too much, given the figure I've been given.
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
First off, congratulations on being in demand. :) You have to be honest with yourself about how much you want to stay involved with this software down the road. Do you just want to cash in on an opportunity? Is there a possibility of taking the utility further? Customizable for other file types, etc..? Do you want to pursue that? Do they have other software needs? So that this sale might open other doors? BW The Biggest Loser
"People look so snooty, take pills make them moody
Automatic bazootie, zero to tutti frutti"
-Hollywood Freaks -
Adam, I am starting to think that a one time payment would be best, but with a open clause for further work as a 'to be discussed' item, if they want it to do anything more than it does currently. My contact did give me a figure that he considered too high - and to be honest, given the functionality of the utility and time I spent doing it, I tend to agree with him! I was more interested, I suppose, in the (quasi-)legal bits and pieces - limited liability clauses and such. I'll have to come up with some kind of EULA...and think about how much is too much, given the figure I've been given.
Don't take a one-time payment. Calculate a licence fee, and charge yearly, so that you keep control of the program. This way, you have a "live" customer, for further work and as a reference. You could have a general "potential-user"-fee. That is, if 4 people work at the place, they have to pay for 4 licences - if they use it or not. Then, you'll have a model for other sales. Remember, if it was good enough for one potential buyer to contact you, there could be more clients out there. Actually, you should get a lawyer to draft a contract, the problem is just finding one (you can't borrow mine :-))
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I wrote a piece of utility software for a medical analyser to help out my fiancee in her university research project. I've just had a call from another hospital asking if they can purchase the software. I have no real experience selling software, but I'm guessing I'd need some sort of EULA and a licensing model??? Per seat? Per site? Bearing in mind this is the NHS and they don't have pots of money to go around....does any one have suggestions? How do I price such a thing? (It is really very specific in that it processes files from a given analyser to make them compatible with another piece of software (not mine, but public domain)). All comments welcome! Thanks
I don't wish to rain on your parade but if it is medical, maybe your first port of call should be an insurance broker to sort out some indemnity insurance and a solicitor to sort out the legal bits such as the EULA. "I'm not a lawyer" but a chat with one could save you the long run - Business Link[^] should be able to put you in touch with someone who can help. "If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?" - Albert Einstein
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I don't wish to rain on your parade but if it is medical, maybe your first port of call should be an insurance broker to sort out some indemnity insurance and a solicitor to sort out the legal bits such as the EULA. "I'm not a lawyer" but a chat with one could save you the long run - Business Link[^] should be able to put you in touch with someone who can help. "If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?" - Albert Einstein
This is something to think about. I checked the other piece of software (for which I was originally modifying the analyser files) and it has the usual 'no warranty expressed or implied' but also has a 'not to be used for diagnostic purposes' clause. Presumably because the author(s) don't want to support it or guarantee it's reliability (since it PD freeware). So, I can really only offer my software under those restrictions...