Can you sell oem software

You may transfer the software to another computer that belongs to you. You may also transfer the software together with the license to a computer owned by someone else if a you are the first licensed user of the software and b the new user agrees to the terms of this agreement.

To make that transfer, you must transfer the original media, the certificate of authenticity, the product key and the proof of purchase directly to that other person, without retaining any copies of the software. You may use the backup copy we allow you to make or the media that the software came on to transfer the software.

Anytime you transfer the software to a new computer, you must remove the software from the prior computer. You may not transfer the software to share licenses between computers. Was this reply helpful? Yes No. Keep in mind that you can still legally only run it on one PC at a time. No, you'd purchase an upgrade license which will work even for a bare install - it'll ask you to type in the license for the product you're upgrading from , which should be at a reduced cost, even from the OEM pricing.

The upgrade license isn't good on its own, though, and will still need the original OEM license for the computer to be legit.

Or you can purchase a full retail copy and use it and then not worry about transferring it to a new computer when that Vista-running computer dies off. Yep I'd rather buy say a few retail copies for systems than buy OEM and every time I upgrade having that cost attached on. Even if I go with a Dell again I'll get it with Linux or something and throw retail on it.

Then it dies I can just move the OS to another. I would be curious how that works though as usually you change a major part you have to go through support and activate or buy another copy. Maybe that is just for OEM though. I forgot about the upgrade been ages since even seen Vista, but you hit the point I was curious about.

If it's a warranty replacement or, in the case of a white-box system, a like-for-like replacement of a failed part as opposed to an upgrade, the license is still valid on the "new" hardware. Just re-validate the licensing and you're good to go.

When you start replacing the MB, CPU, etc to upgrade to newer, better hardware, that's where you start running in to potential issues with the OEM licensing even on the "same" box and may need to purchase a new license to stay legit, depending on what their licensing rules state.

MS has been very clear about this recently, on their OEM pages. Tip Visit Seller Help to find details of any policy issues with your account or listings, and get the information you need to quickly resolve them. We may have to remove a listing if it violates our policies or if the rights owner asks us to.

Electronically delivered goods can only be listed by eBay approved sellers and must follow our policy. Skip to main content. Actual pricing is dependent on the deal structure and the pricing model. Therefore, it is highly recommended that before the parties start negotiation on the pricing, the details of the deal framework should be decided on in advance.

If all the details cannot be decided on in advance, then agreed upon assumptions should be made for all the deal structure variables by both parties. Having pricing negotiation based upon a well-defined deal framework will be much more productive than discussing pricing while deal structure variables are changing.

Optimum Deal Structure: If parties design the optimum deal structure upfront, not only will it make the price negotiation process more productive, it will facilitate an open discussion around defining the best partnership for both parties, without the posturing around price.

To design the optimum deal structure for both parties, start by putting the pricing discussion aside and ask the question; what is the best way to structure the relationship to maximize value for both parties? Once you have defined this best scenario, preferably in writing, the parties can then have a productive negotiation around pricing within the optimum deal structure framework.

If agreement around pricing cannot be reached within the defined optimum deal structure — the parties can then make adjustments to the deal structure to come to an agreement on pricing. Minimums: Most OEM agreements will require the licensee to make an annual minimum commitment. Minimums ensure that the licensee is committed to applying the needed resources to ensure sufficient sale-through to make the relationship appealing for the licensor.

The annual minimum is either paid upfront each year or over quarterly payments. The minimum is then drawn down over time according to the agreed-upon pricing metrics and deal structure.

Once the minimum is fully drawn down, the licensor will then commence payments to the licensee based upon the pricing metrics agreed upon in the contract. Reporting: Consistent and transparent periodic reporting is critical for a successful relationship.

The licensee needs to track usage, customers, end-customer deal sizes, etc. It is essential to have the reporting responsibilities clearly defined upfront in the contract with an agreed-upon process in place to avoid any reporting disputes.

Perfect transparency is necessary to ensure trust between the two parties, trust being the cornerstone of any partnership. In exchange for this scale, the OEM will provide significant discounts off its list pricing. The OEM is gaining scale, more customers — and giving up higher profit margins that could be obtained by going direct to customers. The critical questions in the got to market GTM analysis are:. Will the OEM channel cannibalize some of my customers?

And if yes, to what extent? Will the increased revenue realized through scale outweigh the loss of higher margins from going direct? Competitive Overlap: When you sell through an OEM channel, you will need to assess the competitive overlap and potential revenue loss due to competitive overlap. The number of your customers that are using your software will grow. However, you will inevitably have significantly lower profit margins for each sub-license since volume discounts will be required to sell through the OEM channel.

Protecting Margins: Your prospective OEM partners need to be researched in each vertical market to determine the extent of the competitive overlaps. The revenue gained at scale from the OEM channel will need to be higher than the lost opportunities of going direct to the end-customer. The time frame used when analyzing this equation is critical to making the best business decision. Or on the flip side, a company may want to pass on near term OEM opportunities for a longer-term strategy.

Vertical Market Protection: If your company is very strong in a particular vertical, and you are concerned that there will be too much competitive overlap, one solution is to limit the markets your OEM partner can sell to.

Or, in reverse, if your OEM partner is well entrenched in a specialized market where your company has limited success, you can restrict that OEM partner to that one specific vertical. The risk of competitive overlap and cannibalization can be addressed through a well-thought out strategy and putting the appropriate protections in place. Once these risks are taken out of the equation — or you have assessed that the risks are worth the upside — there are many benefits when selling through an OEM channel.

OEM channels can often enable a company to access new companies, markets, verticals where they have only had limited success. For example, federal government markets often take many years to develop. You need government relationships, security clearances, GSA published pricing and access to specific programs.

Instead of starting from scratch, you can partner with companies with a successful history in the space and are already selling solutions into the Federal market, shaving years off your GTM strategy. The same strategy can be applied for other specialized verticals such as finance and pharma that require significant resources, time, and vertical market expertise to enter. OEM channels can enable companies to expand their user base exponentially. Appropriately executed an OEM channel can give a company outstanding credibility and massive market exposure in a short time frame.

The value gained from credibility and market exposure alone could be worth doing a deal at any price, especially for startups or smaller companies with limited visibility. Developing OEM channels will expand a customer base quickly, thereby seeding the market for new sales opportunities. An expanded customer base can create direct or indirect upsell opportunities for supplemental.

If your technology is being distributed through an OEM channel with limited functionality, your salespeople can reach out directly to the end-customers and offer supplemental technology. For instance, a company that provides natural language query NLQ functionality through OEM channels could then offer the end-customers an added feature of voice-activated NLQ. Another example might be a company that sells AI technology to identify fraud in internal accounting systems could then offer the end-customers the ability to extend those capabilities outside their internal account systems to other parts of their business.

When a smaller company is licensing OEM software of high value to a larger company, the smaller company can often become an acquisition target. The chances of such offers can be increased by structuring a deal that provides limits to the larger company that can be overcome through acquisition. This could be limiting the distribution to a specific set of customers or providing limited access to customization and integration capabilities.

The OEM contract creates a working relationship between the companies on many different levels, and the technology is validated and valued by the larger company. This creates a fertile environment for the larger company to think about the potential gains of acquiring the OEM. Once your company has assessed the market potential, validated demand, and has decided to move forward with developing OEM channels, here are some ideas and strategies to consider. OEM sales require an extremely targeted strategy.

You need to determine precisely 1 what named companies you are targeting and 2 what unique and compelling value proposition you will present to each one. Your value proposition should first and foremost lead from a business standpoint, supported by the technology that will enable the business outcome.

Here are some initial questions that should be thought through when developing your go-to-market strategy:. Based on your market analysis, you determine that many software applications have primitive data visualization and can benefit by licensing your visualization capabilities. You decouple your data visualization technology and productize it as a solution optimized for easy integration that can be sold through an OEM channel.

The above GTM analysis will be done for each promising vertical you identify — the low-hanging fruit. The results of your GTM analysis will then guide your marketing and sales strategy for each vertical. Your OEM target list will go through an extreme qualification process since many variables need to be in place to identify key OEM targets. Therefore, OEM sales teams are usually smaller and more specialized than sales teams focused on end-customers.

Sales Professionals who focus on OEM have the needed experience and skills to put together complex deals at the executive level. The ability to manage teams, both internally and externally, is essential.

Although the volume of sales is smaller, the deals themselves are significantly larger. In building an OEM channel, there can be internal competition between your direct sales force and your OEM sales force because end-customers can also be potential OEM customers. It is paramount to create alignment between direct sales and your OEM sales force and foster teamwork.

One organizational method is to have OEM overlays work with the direct sales force and diffuse conflict by expanding the commission for opportunities that involve two sales professionals — thereby promoting teamwork. With a 1. There are many ways to structure OEM overlays and incentivize cooperation between sales teams. The key is to have all sales professionals aligned to achieve the same goal without any internal friction.

Sales cycles for an OEM are usually long; six to 12 months is not atypical. Understanding some of the reasons why these sales cycles are long will help you deploy tactics to help accelerate the sales cycle. All the above can be addressed through a well-thought out strategy, deploying the right tactics at the right time, and working on multiple threads in parallel.

As you are working with your target OEM partner, intermediate steps may sometimes be needed to create trust, illustrate demand, and build value if your partner is not ready to make a commitment.