News

Microsoft Holds Line on ISA Server 2004 Price

• By Scott Bekker
• May 27, 2004

SAN DIEGO -- Microsoft didn't manage to get Internet Security & Acceleration Server 2004 out the door in time for its TechEd conference here, but the company did go ahead and unveil pricing for its second-generation firewall, VPN and Web caching server.

"We had hoped that this would be the event where you'd get the bits, but they're very, very close to the bits," Gordon Mangione, corporate vice president for Microsoft's security business and technology unit, told a group of technical product reviewers this week. TechEd attendees received a copy of the release candidate version of ISA Server 2004 in their conference bags.

Microsoft normally waits until a product is released to manufacturing to unveil pricing. But lead product manager Jonathan Perrera said the standard edition of ISA Server 2004 will cost $1,499 per processor. That is the same price Microsoft had charged for the standard edition of ISA Server 2000. Microsoft recently gave Software Assurance customers a 20 percent price break on ISA Server 2000 until May 31, but the deal was more like a clearance sale than a signal of a lower price to come for ISA Server 2004.

Pricing has not been determined for ISA Server 2004 Enterprise Edition, which will ship sometime after the standard edition. ISA Server 2000 Enterprise Edition costs $5,999 per processor.