SUPPORT LIFECYCLE POLICY
Basic Support Lifecycle
In order to easily estimate the lifecycle of our costomers' IT systems, we provide five years of paid support from the date of the end of general availability (end of sale) of the software product.
- NoteDue to various circumstances, we may not be able to provide 5 years of paid support.
Mainstream Phase
In the Mainstream Phase, we provide support services defined by each software product.
Its period is shorter one either "5 years later from sales starting date" or "1 year later from sales starting date of 2nd generation version*1".
- *1Paid Support is provided for the latest two versions (2-version support), which is the unit of generation. Please check the product information page on our official website for the major or minor version of each product.
Extended Support Phase
It is a phase for which we support migration to the latest version within Mainstream Phase or successor/alternative products. Generally, we do not expand the operating environment or provide fix modules, but support services other than these are available same as in Mainstream Phase.
The Extended Support Phase will end a minimum of two years after the end of the Mainstream Phase, and will end at the end of the most recent May (in principle*2) after two years have passed since the transition to the Extended Support Phase.
- *2The date will not be changed to the end of May for items that have already been determined to be other than the end of May.
Self-Support Phase
It is a phase for which customers do self-support on their own by use of patch programs and reference of information on our website after the end of the Paid Support phase.
This period is one year after the end of the Extended Support phase.
Examples of Support Lifecycle
Example of releasing a new version of a generation unit every year
One year after the start of general availability after two generations is earlier than five years after the start of general availability, so Mainstream is three years. In this case, Extended Support will be 3 years in order to provide 5 years of Paid Support from the end of general availability(GA).
- *3Due to the preconditions of the latest 2 versions support, we may not be able to provide 5 years of Paid Support.
Example of releasing a new version of a generational unit every two years
Mainstream will be available for 5 years, since 1 year after the start of general availability after 2 generations coincides with 5 years after the start of general availability.
- *4Due to the preconditions of the latest 2 versions support, we may not be able to provide 5 years of Paid Support.
Example of releasing a new version of a generational unit every three years
Mainstream will be 5 years from the start of the general availability. In this case, Extended Support will be 3 years in order to provide 5 years of Paid Support from the end of general availability.
- *5Due to the preconditions of the latest 2 versions support, we may not be able to provide 5 years of Paid Support.
This policy applies to products generally available after April 2012.
(Updated June 18, 2021)