Adding nodes (seats) to a “free upgrade” product
15 February 2008—One way for us to keep our operating costs down is to reduce our support costs. To that end, we are announcing a clarification of our policy regarding the purchase of additional nodes or seats on Helix products that were received as free upgrades.
Here’s an example of how it works: If you purchased a new Helix Server license with three (3) seats or upgraded such a license to version 5.1.x, you would then have received a free upgrade to version 5.2 when it came out. Then some time later, you decided to add another seat (or more) to the 5.2 Server.
Prior to this change in policy, you would have been charged for the cost of each additional 5.1.1 seat at the new seat price and then have been charged one USU (currently valued at $30) as a fee for creating the additional key for version 5.2.
With this change in policy, once a subsequent version of a product has shipped (i.e., if the “current” version is newer than the one for which you want the additional nodes or seats), you are required to upgrade the entire license to match the version. Thus, instead of paying for one new seat and a key fee, you must first purchase an upgrade to the version you got for free and then add the seat(s) at that version’s new seat price.