Open to question [analysis]

Open source software adoption in enterprise computing is growing but this does not mean that it is suitable for every enterprise. E&T considers some reasons to stick with the ´closed source´ model. Open source and commercial software are of about the same quality, and able to achieve similar results.User training, the hardware the products run on, and support staff all have a tangible cost; and in even a medium-sized organisations the volume discounts and site licences that are available from software vendors bring the purchase price of commercial software down significantly from the official list-price. The physical cost of providing a software product to an organisation is no more than a few pounds for a manual and a CD, which means that the vendor of commercial software can discount as far as they wish (or, more accurately, feel necessary) in order to secure a sale. It´s also common to offer discounts to get a foot in the door; once a vendor has persuaded a client to adopt its product, the cost and effort of moving away either to a competitor product or an open source rival can far outweigh the benefits of adopting that alternative product.