Once the decision has been made to dispose of a software business, there are a variety of exit options, each with a distinct set of implications depending on which road you take. Do you end-of-life (EOL) the asset for a hard landing, or do you work with DKG on a lift-out strategy delivering a soft landing?
End of Life
- Hard landing for customers
- Short-term cost to seller is low
- Long-term costs are potentially high
- Relatively fast process
- Liabilities and include customer satisfaction, brand damage, multi-year ELA commitments, spill-over to other business units, sales morale, and ongoing support
- HR issues include terminations and severance package expenses
- Long-term support commitments persist and become problematic
- Cloud & High- Service Level Agreement (SLA) assets require special treatment
Lift-Out
- Soft landing for customers
- Short-term cost to seller is higher
- Long-term cost/risk is much lower
- Slower and more complicated process
- Protects and potentially improves customer satisfaction and in-pipeline deals, boosting sales morale
- Ensures that multi-year ELA commitments are met
- Mitigates brand damage
- HR issues mitigated via transfers
- Support, cloud and high-SLA transitions can be mitigated
- Process is complex – most organizations do not have processes or expertise to manage the disposition process and ongoing transition
