Fusion 360 *Legacy* subscription - Price increase?? USD$310 to USD$545?

[jerry.fountain]

It was my understanding that by subscribing to the "Legacy" product of Fusion 360 it was a "locked-in" price (call it early adopter, legacy, whatever).  I just received an email stating that the legacy price of $310 per seat now will move to $545.

I'm not here to argue if there is value or not. That's a whole separate topic.  But, I *am* asking to discuss the seeming change in policy for Legacy subscription holders.  Is this a correct change? Or was this just an over-zealous "send all" type email that escaped marketing?  It would be great to get an official reply.  In the meantime I'm headed to search old emails for the exact language from the time.  I will say, for me, this will impact my likelihood of renewing going forward based on my usage and net value TO ME.  Everyone is their own unique case. 

Note: Searching back in the marketing materials from when I subscribed. 

"Thanks for subscribing to Fusion 360. For a limited time, I have an exclusive offer for you.

If you or someone in your organization is interested in purchasing Fusion 360, buy now for $310 and save $185 on an annual subscription. Not only will you save, but you'll be locked in to that price so long as you continue to renew each year."

[seth.madore · Accepted solution]

No, "locked in pricing" has not been effected with this price increase

[matthewZYM62]

Same here. We are "locked in" at $405 (Canadian), but have just received the same email advising that the "base price" will be increasing to $710 (Canadian) which is a huge change. I am hoping this email has been sent in error to legacy customers and that the "base price" it refers to is the cost of new, non-legacy, seats.

[Famine]

Would like an answer to this as well.  I have a legacy subscription $310 with tax.  This would be a good to know as my subscription will be expiring soon. 

[Famine]

I see it was answered, I didn't see the answer posted when I put in the reply.

[jerry.fountain]

Thanks for the reply Seth.  I'd like to suggest that marketing send out a corrective email. Otherwise your support lines are going to be filled with angry customers. If one doesn't get sent out, perhaps someone looking for darker motives might think this is to clear the legacy roles since if you miss renewal, you'll lose the old locked-in price.

[seth.madore]

---

@jerry.fountain wrote:

If one doesn't get sent out, perhaps someone looking for darker motives might think this is to clear the legacy roles since if you miss renewal, you'll lose the old locked-in price.

---

That's quite the cynical view 🙂

[brianrepp]

@jerry.fountain glad you made the post and gave us the opportunity to clarify.  We're now looking into a targeted clarification email for those on unique "locked-in" subscriptions such as yours.

[dmorris750]

I was pissed when I initially saw the increase email.  I'm surprised but thankful that it won't apply to my locked in subscription.

Between shuffling pay and non pay features around at will, making the disparity between the base software and extension prices so extreme,  making so many separate extension costs, and the fact that the software is still so buggy that it CRASHES AT LEAST ONCE A DAY.....I am about done trying to make Fusion 360 work for the things it is pledged to do.  

Every time an upgrade happens I cringe at what workarounds(for previous glitches) I was told to use will now be broken and which files will no longer work.....this has happened several times with significant impact to my business.

If it weren't for the AMAZING people on the other end of the bottom right support button, I would probably already be gone.

I feel like I am being charged more and more to continually Beta test glitchy software that doesn't do what it is touted to.  Once features do work correctly, they are moved into a paid extension.

AUTODESK, you couple the way you are treating your Fusion customers with the billing BOMB you lit the fuse on that is waiting around the corner for a lot of your Inventor clients, and I'd start getting pretty concerned!!!

[jerry.fountain]

Naw.  Just trying to highlight that marketing needs to be careful.  I try to assume positive intent.  

[jerry.fountain]

Kudos to the team. Just received the clarification email indicating Legacy and Early Adopters are all still locked in. 😍

[Kenny.Duval]

Just Autodesk being Autodesk. You'll get hosed out of your legacy pricing soon enough.

[Nyxius]

I had to drop my sub after college because money is tight.  I need to use cad again for personal uses and I'm stunned to see that the "Discounted" rate went up to 680 per year (after the 30% discount) and to add insult to injury all the features that made the software useful are now extra (by a lot).  I'm a private individual so this represents a significant recurring expense for a radically diminished value.  You can argue all the value points you want, but the only opinion about value that matters is your customers... mine, et al.  I really liked what fusion was... but I can't justify this.  I've decided not to restart my subscription without first looking at your competitors.  Times are tough for everyone... your execs might do well to consider ways to get skinny.  Because if your customers have a hard time, then its only a matter of time before you do as well.

[seth.madore]

@Nyxius I was wondering if you could expand on what limitations in the Personal (free) license are deal breakers for you? We do understand that a commercial license is not a good fit for everyone, but I'm specifically curious where the Personal entitlement falls short for your needs?

[Nyxius]

I'm not talking about the free version. I'm taking about the paid version. I can model things in any CAD, the thing that made fusion useful was the engineering simulation. The free version is limited to 10 documents and doesn't have access to any of the useful things like the electronics, simulation, or cam. So I WAS going to start subscribing again, but I'm not willing to throw that kind of money away on a hobby. Not when I could throw that money at a new printer or something with equity and an roi. If it was a permanent license, then yeah, I might consider it because then it would represent a software asset. But a subscription has no inherent persistent value. I also don't like that fact that everything is stuck on the cloud and requires internet access for functionality. I have a nice computer and cloud stuff is both an inconvenience and a waste. I live in the middle of nowhere and Internet is slow and annoying. So long story short, the free version is handcuffed and the paid version is an expensive rental. Call it entitlement if you want, but that's you're perspective. I'm doing you the courtesy of telling you that I can't participate in your business model... at least not on a scale that really benefits either of us. Funny thing is, I can remember when I actually bought expensive licenses to each new year. My very first one was AutoCAD LT 2004 and I bought it while in highschool. 

As you can see, I stopped doing that when your company moved to the subscription model. I'm not really interested in your security, your servers, your accounts, or any of the other casualties of your network managed business. All of that is stuff that might be useful to a business, but has zero utility to me and represents only additional liability. All of the things that might justify that liability have now been stripped from the free version and are too expensive for me to justify the paid version. The only reason I'm still using the free version is the legacy files that I still have from previous projects in your software. You might call them anchor files.  I have a lot of things that I want to make and I have personal goals that I want to make progress on, but I'm not certain that fusion represents a step towards accomplishment of those goals. 

[jbfurniturea]

My understanding was the Legacy price was locked in until 2027 but that doesn't seem to be the case. The support specialist says Legacy gets the global pricing.  I am getting charged something like $1800 for a 3 year now when it should be closer to $1000 if the locked in pricing was true.

[jbfurniturea]

I agree. The cloud extras and other bloatware trying to be pushed I don't need. Just give me Fusion. If you need all the extras then great you have that option but I don't like how those who don't need the extras are getting negatively impacted on the price. A while back they dropped the prices of the extension but then increased the price of the main program. That change hurt anyone who didn't use the extensions.

[CGBenner]

@RajkumarIlanchelian Hi, can you take a look at these most recent comments?

[Red_Ant_Engineering]

Is there anywhere where AutoDesk gives a clear indication of what a Legacy Subscription entails and how long it goes for?

Im having  an ongoing email discussion with one of the customer service guys, and despite me having a legacy subscription, they keep "changing the goal posts" in order to justify the seemingly random pricing increases that they apply each year.

it would be useful to have a clear understanding of where I stand with a legacy subscription, as I get the impression the guy I am dealing with is just making stuff up!

Cheers,

Mike