It's a little bit expensive. I know that there are other vendors that offer more affordable options. But in general, the technology we acquire from Cisco is quite expensive due to the high taxes imposed by the government on technology. We have explored options from other countries as well. But we have been using Cisco for more than ten years. Since 2010, we have been using Cisco. We used to have Enterasys before that. But since 2010, we have been using Cisco.
Senior Network/Security/collaboration Engineer at Abdulla Fouad Group
Real User
2022-03-23T21:25:22Z
Mar 23, 2022
If you compare Cisco hardware to any other vendors, such as HPE, they are more expensive. There is a license to use the solution. If my customer's licenses are about to expire I receive notification from Cisco, this is very helpful.
Senior Network Engineer at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Real User
2021-08-23T11:47:36Z
Aug 23, 2021
I can't speak to the pricing as I am not in procurement. Once it gets delivered, we'll put it in the network and then we'll configure it and then operate it. We are in operations. We don't directly handle licensing.
The pricing is a little bit high, however, we didn't use all the facilities and when we pay for a license, we pay a lot. That said, we only use a little bit from those licenses. In the local market, this solution is considered pricey. It might be fair pricing from the point of view of Cisco, however, it may be too high from the point of view of Romanian companies. Right now, we should upgrade our wireless LAN controller, the controller WLC, and that means that we should switch to another assembly controller and we will lose all the licenses that we already have on the actual WLCs. It's not an easy decision.
Licensing is annual or every three years. We were one of the big customers, and we used to get good prices, but the cost of the support need to be improved.
Network Manager at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
2020-11-09T19:38:57Z
Nov 9, 2020
I thought that it would be less expensive. I always thought that Cisco charges more because of who they are, above the product itself. Whilst it's the best of the breed, and it's the top right-hand corner at Gartner, I wonder how long that would be attractive.
Consultant at a mining and metals company with 201-500 employees
Consultant
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
The license for Cisco Nexus is one year to three years, in this case for the SMARTnet. It is a price per unit, in terms of this specific appliance. That's something I could see Cisco doing a better job with, i.e. managing SMARTnet contracts for customers. Too much of the onus is on the customer to manage their SMARTnet contracts. They always do a bad job at that. It's a miss for the customers because they don't have the protection that they need. It's a miss for Cisco because they don't have the revenue. Cisco needs to rely more on its distributors to take on that role, but I don't think they always do.
Cisco's licensing structures can be complex across different technologies, for example, unified communications. The ACI licensing is not so bad. As they are moving to the DNA Essentials, as opposed to the old Cisco One Advantage-type solution, it is adding a little more complexity to the licensing scenarios. But in general, I think that Cisco is moving toward synching everything up and trying to get everything licensed in a similar way, whether its a data center switch or a campus network switch. I'm fine with where Cisco is moving to.
Sr Network Engineer at a energy/utilities company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
The licensing is the area that we are working that's a challenge. With smart licensing, it's all new to us. It used to be, we purchased something and the license was IP-based. With advanced services, you go in and add more depth or details to the license.
Senior Voice Network Engineer at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
We have a perpetual license, which means that when we purchase a box, there's no license in the box. Those 9K's are just routers. They're like big data center switches.
Network Engineer at a transportation company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
We do yearly licensing. I don't directly pay for Cisco Nexus. Enterprise, above me, pays for all our licensing across the United States. I know we do pay a yearly fee for our portion.
Product Manager - Networking & Security at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
MSP
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
Customers do not understand the new licenses or subscription very well. Cisco should work on this. The subscription for licensing is expensive while other vendors provide a switch with everything at a lower price.
IT Manager Network at a transportation company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
2019-06-19T08:36:00Z
Jun 19, 2019
I am intimately aware of what the licensing costs are with Cisco Nexus. It depends on what we decide, how much margin, and what our strategy is when we have an intersection point to where we think won't be spending money on equipment we aren't going to use. I have already had conversations, here and at the five portals required to manage the licensing, with the new OS releases and the requirement to use the smart license portal. There are too many portals. We need a manager. Cisco Nexus is similar to other licensing costs but it's painful right now. I've sent everything to our account executive to work with for our systems integration and logistical partners. They need to solve this and help train the team. There's a big gap in there. Cisco Nexus is very costly for the service. It's insurance in case something happens. We have a very good strategy that we're happy with, it's just the renewal process that is problematic on the license. When I walked through the customer experience center and explained the situation, they got a good feel for how much pain and suffering it's been. Cisco needs to understand how hard the renewals are each year for us. Even having the SmartNet Total Care portal, having a person dedicated to the distributors, etc. it's still a mess. If the incentives get better, which I know Cisco is working on, it would be great, right now, we're buying the license year-to-year. We have three hundred to four hundred data centers of Nexus. So the coverage associated with Smart Net, 27 by 4, is basically what we spend each year.
The Cisco Nexus family of switches is designed to meet the stringent requirements of the next-generation data center. Not simply bigger or faster, these switches offer the following characteristics: infrastructure that can be scaled cost-effectively and that helps you increase energy, budget, and resource efficiency, transport that can navigate the transition to 10 Gigabit Ethernet and unified fabric and can also handle architectural changes such as virtualization, Web 2.0 applications, and...
I rate the pricing an eight out of ten.
Nexus is a costly solution. However, it's an excellent device, so you expect the price to be high. It has a three-year license.
The solution is very expensive. Currently, we pay an yearly licensing cost. I rate the pricing a nine out of ten.
It's a little bit expensive. I know that there are other vendors that offer more affordable options. But in general, the technology we acquire from Cisco is quite expensive due to the high taxes imposed by the government on technology. We have explored options from other countries as well. But we have been using Cisco for more than ten years. Since 2010, we have been using Cisco. We used to have Enterasys before that. But since 2010, we have been using Cisco.
If you compare Cisco hardware to any other vendors, such as HPE, they are more expensive. There is a license to use the solution. If my customer's licenses are about to expire I receive notification from Cisco, this is very helpful.
I don't like the Smart Licensing models that Cisco uses.
The solution is relatively expensive when compared with Cisco Catalyst.
The subscription model and price could be better.
The solution should be more cost-effective in general. There is an annual licensing fee.
I can't speak to the pricing as I am not in procurement. Once it gets delivered, we'll put it in the network and then we'll configure it and then operate it. We are in operations. We don't directly handle licensing.
The solution, in general, is a bit pricey, and you need to pay extra for support, which can also be expensive.
As I deal with the technical aspects of the solution, I am not in a position to comment on the price.
The pricing is a little bit high, however, we didn't use all the facilities and when we pay for a license, we pay a lot. That said, we only use a little bit from those licenses. In the local market, this solution is considered pricey. It might be fair pricing from the point of view of Cisco, however, it may be too high from the point of view of Romanian companies. Right now, we should upgrade our wireless LAN controller, the controller WLC, and that means that we should switch to another assembly controller and we will lose all the licenses that we already have on the actual WLCs. It's not an easy decision.
We have a virtual license.
The solution is expensive.
Licensing is annual or every three years. We were one of the big customers, and we used to get good prices, but the cost of the support need to be improved.
We work with our account manager to negotiate a good price, so overall, I think the pricing is fair.
The problem with Cisco, from what I see, is that their costs are much higher. The costs depend on the features you need, and the license is expensive.
The Nexus 9000 is very competitively priced.
The price of the product is reasonable.
I am not aware of the costs for this solution, it is handled by the accounting department.
I thought that it would be less expensive. I always thought that Cisco charges more because of who they are, above the product itself. Whilst it's the best of the breed, and it's the top right-hand corner at Gartner, I wonder how long that would be attractive.
The licensing is all over the place and hard to figure out. They don't seem to bundle features. Everything is always an extra cost.
Our licensing costs are yearly.
I don't really deal with the pricing but I know that it's not cheap.
From an engineering perspective, the pros outweigh the cons in terms of price.
The license for Cisco Nexus is one year to three years, in this case for the SMARTnet. It is a price per unit, in terms of this specific appliance. That's something I could see Cisco doing a better job with, i.e. managing SMARTnet contracts for customers. Too much of the onus is on the customer to manage their SMARTnet contracts. They always do a bad job at that. It's a miss for the customers because they don't have the protection that they need. It's a miss for Cisco because they don't have the revenue. Cisco needs to rely more on its distributors to take on that role, but I don't think they always do.
Our licensing fees are approximately $2,000 USD per year.
Every Cisco product is more expensive than competitors on the market, which is just a fact, but from my perspective, it is worth it.
All of our costs including subscription, licensing, and support services are bundled together, and the cost is approximately $100,000 USD per year.
Our licensing costs for this solution are approximately $200 USD per month.
Cisco's licensing structures can be complex across different technologies, for example, unified communications. The ACI licensing is not so bad. As they are moving to the DNA Essentials, as opposed to the old Cisco One Advantage-type solution, it is adding a little more complexity to the licensing scenarios. But in general, I think that Cisco is moving toward synching everything up and trying to get everything licensed in a similar way, whether its a data center switch or a campus network switch. I'm fine with where Cisco is moving to.
The license on a yearly basis is $200,000.
The licensing is the area that we are working that's a challenge. With smart licensing, it's all new to us. It used to be, we purchased something and the license was IP-based. With advanced services, you go in and add more depth or details to the license.
We have a perpetual license, which means that when we purchase a box, there's no license in the box. Those 9K's are just routers. They're like big data center switches.
The licensing fees for this solution are approximately $800,000 USD annually.
We do yearly licensing. I don't directly pay for Cisco Nexus. Enterprise, above me, pays for all our licensing across the United States. I know we do pay a yearly fee for our portion.
The price of this solution is good when compared to others in the market. When we purchased the hardware, the software license came with it.
We only have a yearly support contract, as we do not use any of the subscription-based functions at this time.
Our licensing fees are paid annually.
This solution should be made more affordable.
We have a three-year subscription for our licensing fees. For us, this product is perfect for what we need and it came at the perfect price point.
It's around $160K a year for our license.
Customers do not understand the new licenses or subscription very well. Cisco should work on this. The subscription for licensing is expensive while other vendors provide a switch with everything at a lower price.
We do yearly licensing.
I am intimately aware of what the licensing costs are with Cisco Nexus. It depends on what we decide, how much margin, and what our strategy is when we have an intersection point to where we think won't be spending money on equipment we aren't going to use. I have already had conversations, here and at the five portals required to manage the licensing, with the new OS releases and the requirement to use the smart license portal. There are too many portals. We need a manager. Cisco Nexus is similar to other licensing costs but it's painful right now. I've sent everything to our account executive to work with for our systems integration and logistical partners. They need to solve this and help train the team. There's a big gap in there. Cisco Nexus is very costly for the service. It's insurance in case something happens. We have a very good strategy that we're happy with, it's just the renewal process that is problematic on the license. When I walked through the customer experience center and explained the situation, they got a good feel for how much pain and suffering it's been. Cisco needs to understand how hard the renewals are each year for us. Even having the SmartNet Total Care portal, having a person dedicated to the distributors, etc. it's still a mess. If the incentives get better, which I know Cisco is working on, it would be great, right now, we're buying the license year-to-year. We have three hundred to four hundred data centers of Nexus. So the coverage associated with Smart Net, 27 by 4, is basically what we spend each year.
Our licensing costs for this solution are approximately $100K a year for the switching part.