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① Commercial desk · Software AG
Adabas and Natural estates are priced against one assumption: that you cannot leave. We negotiate Software AG renewals from documented baselines, tested metrics, and a modernization position credible enough to change the math, whether or not you ever execute it.
Audit notice or renewal under 18 months out? We mobilize within 48 hours.
Get expert help →Software AG has reshaped itself around its mainframe business: after divesting webMethods and StreamSets to IBM in 2024 and selling further lines, Adabas & Natural now operates as a standalone business with publicly committed support horizons. For buyers, the strategic signal matters more than the corporate news: a vendor refocused on a captive installed base typically prices that base for yield, and Adabas and Natural estates running decades of core workload are as captive as software gets.
The contracts compound the problem. Agreements signed in the 1990s and amended across CPU generations commonly carry ambiguous metric definitions, and ambiguity at renewal or in an audit typically resolves toward the vendor unless the buyer has documented its own position first. Background: the Software AG publisher guide.
Five steps, in order
The captivity premium stops being silently accepted. A renewal that opens with "this is what continuity costs" gets answered with a documented entitlement record, an independent consumption position, and a modernization case with real numbers attached. Ambiguous legacy clauses get clarified on your terms while you have leverage, instead of interpreted against you later. And because we negotiate Software AG agreements repeatedly while your team sees one every few years, the vendor's standard moves, the audit adjacent pressure, the support uncertainty framing, the end of negotiation uplift, arrive anticipated.
Across 500+ engagements and $180M+ of negotiated mainframe spend, prepared buyers typically close Software AG renewals 20 to 35% below the initial quote, with metric clarity and exit preservation that outlast the term.
Mainframe spend negotiated
Engagements delivered
Typical renewal reduction
Mobilization on audit notice or renewal
Adabas & Natural remains with Software AG, which now operates it as a standalone business after divesting webMethods and StreamSets to IBM in 2024 and selling other lines. The mainframe products were not part of the IBM acquisition. Ownership context matters at renewal because a refocused vendor typically prices its remaining installed base for yield.
More than most teams assume. Leverage comes from contract baselines, metric definitions, term structure, timing, and a credible long range modernization position, not only from a funded migration. Vendors price the absence of preparation; preparation itself moves the number. See Adabas renewal leverage without migration.
Audit and verification activity is commonly observed around older Adabas and Natural agreements, where decades of platform changes, CPU upgrades, and contract amendments leave measurement definitions ambiguous. Ambiguity typically resolves in the vendor's favor unless the buyer documents its own position first.
We advise on the licensing and commercial side: what an exit really costs, what staying really costs, and how to use the comparison honestly in negotiation. We are independent, paid by buyers only, with no stake in either outcome.
Related desks: Software AG audit defense, Software AG renewal advisory, and the firm wide license negotiation service.