The latest Embedded Infrastructureand Mass- Deployment Cost-of-Ownership Study from the Aberdeen Group (Boston, Massachusetts) summarized the findings as follows:

The lowest “visible” cost of ownership (VCO) for workgroup embedded infrastructure in a massdeployment architecture belongs to Progress OpenEdge when compared with the Microsoft embedded infrastructure solutions over a five-year period. Aberdeen defines VCO as the cost of ownership that the IT (information technology) buyer may reasonably anticipate before buying a product, based on its history and not including sales discounts. Aberdeen estimates that the Progress VCO over five years is, on average, at least 40% less expensive than Microsoft’s. Although initial costs were higher for Progress in small workgroup environments, ongoing fees and anticipated database administrator (DBA) costs were both lower.

The lowest VCO for enterprise embedded infrastructure in a mass deployment architecture belongs to Progress OpenEdge. Aberdeen estimates that the Progress VCO over five years is, on average, one-tenth as expensive as Oracle’s VCO and one-half as expensive as IBM’s VCO. Initial costs were usually lower for Progress OpenEdge, and ongoing fees and anticipated DBA costs were clearly lower. Progress’s advantage is especially marked in large-scale mass deployment architectures. In these architectures, administrative costs dominate, and Progress’s superiority in administrative costs makes it especially attractive.