Featured Article from Software Monetization

Sure, most software companies have talented developers on staff that are capable of developing a custom licensing and monetization solution for their products. But when it comes to software monetization, a more important question for any business is not if they have the capability of crafting a solution, but whether it’s worthwhile to do so.

“In 99 percent of cases, the answer is going to be ‘no,’” according to a video on the topic from Gemalto’s Sentinel Software Monetization group. “And no for several reasons. To build a solution internally, you’re going to either have to train your developers in security, or recruit developers with the required skills.”

That endeavor is going to take time, training and money and can easily be avoided by purchasing a proven software licensing and monetization solution like Sentinel. With an established solution, software companies can focus development efforts on their own software as well as meeting long-term business goals and objectives.  And that translates to saving time and money as well as getting products to market faster.

Purchasing a proven solution is also beneficial in that it offers copyright and intellectual property (IP) protection. Not only that, but solutions are consistently updated to address the latest security risks as well as to support cross platform deployment and a variety of development environments and browsers. A company developing its own solution will need to keep re-engineering the software to account for updates and support issues, which is once again expensive and time consuming.

An additional reason to buy instead of build when it comes to software monetization is packaging. When building a custom solution, companies are required to re-engineer the licensing and monetization code each time they update their product or change its packaging and delivery mechanism. This isn’t the case with an established monetization solution.

“Once the Sentinel licensing API is integrated in your product, your application can be easily bundled into multiple packages without the involvement of engineering,” claims the Sentinel group.

Software licensing and monetization are critical for any company with intellectual property to protect and that company will inevitably need to decide whether developing a custom solution or purchasing an established one makes more sense. In nearly every situation, the benefits of buying a software monetization offering outweigh the time, cost and management work involved in building a solution.