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• May 28, 2004 •
This week, at Microsoft® TechEd 2004, Microsoft Corporate Vice President of Server and Tools Marketing Andrew Lees announced to attendees the June 1 launch of an expanded and enhanced product support life-cycle policy. The updated policy will provide customers with a minimum total of 10 years of mainstream and extended support for business and developer products. In addition to the expanded time frame, the updated policy provides customers with increased support for IT infrastructure security assistance. Customers requested support from Microsoft that is predictable, expanded and mirrors their changing needs for IT infrastructure management. With this announcement, Microsoft delivers the predictable support customers need to successfully do more with less.
"Both the original and updated Microsoft support life-cycle policy were the result of the company's dedication to continually listening and acting on customer needs," Lees said. "We have heard our customers' requests and are quickly expanding and enhancing the policy to provide a minimum total of 10 years of support for business and developer products."
Previously, Microsoft Corp. offered five years of mainstream support and two years of extended support for business and developer products. The updated policy provides customers with five years of mainstream support after the date of general availability or two years after the successor product ships, whichever is longer. Microsoft also will provide extended support for five years after mainstream support ends or two years after the second successor product ships, whichever is longer. The policy now provides customers with a minimum total of 10 years of product support, including security updates and paid incident support, as well as increased flexibility and peace of mind about the level of support provided throughout the life cycle of the product and during subsequent product release migrations.
The updated support life-cycle policy primarily affects business and developer products currently in the mainstream support phase as well as future products. The new policy update does not apply to consumer, hardware, multimedia and Microsoft Business Solutions products.
Detailed information regarding how the updated support policy specifically affects individual Microsoft products can be found at the Microsoft support life-cycle policy Web site.
