They would be able to handle the features they need entirely in house, and if multiple companies need the same or similar features this allows more resources to be put towards that thing
FOSS software would be actively maintained but a massive network of the companies that use the software, instead of relying on the small teams or individuals for whom its a pet project
I think this system would generate far more robust software and the ecosystem to support it
Those resources can be geared towards supporting and contributing to open source (that they use internally) instead of giving money to these corporations for shit support and "maybe we'll add the feature you want (but probably not, and we're increasing the cost BTW ^^)"
And there's the additional challenge of actually getting contributions landed upsream, which requires work from other maintainers.
One of them is 4x the compensation of the other one...
If everyone is supporting FOSS with their own developers, which they can pay more wages to because they aren't shelling out to Microsoft and apple, then Microsoft won't have as much income with which to pay exorbitant salaries.
Multiple parts of the system interact, dont assume nothing else changes with this massive shift (I'm not only talking about the German gov doing this, but all companies)
That would require a huge coordination effort. There's going to be several companies that want different features and have their own devs on payroll (at different rates). VS Microsoft that can just organize a meeting with the leads for Office and plan out the roadmap.
Also, exorbitant is one way of seeing it, but does it hold when you consider the insane added value these devs bring to millions of businesses?
> I'm not only talking about the German gov doing this, but all companies
The other issue, specifically with government, is that salaries are capped to public servant scales. There's no way they can hire Microsoft or Google talent at these rates.
Windows is about the cost of a single support call to IT, so if it's just that much easier to maintain, it's worth it. Maybe it is, maybe it's not, but the cost threshold is right there.
It's the cost of a nice keyboard or mouse for gosh sakes.
The cost really shouldn't be hugely part of the equation, I mean, you want to negotiate for it of course, but beyond that it's mostly not the cost.
this says "In 2018, the central government had spent €73m ($80m) on Microsoft licenses, around €25m ($27.5m) over the forecast budget – and that was without the cost of providing German state governments with Microsoft software.
As opposition politicians pointed out, the total amounts to hundreds of millions of taxpayers' money."
Red-Hat is hardly cheaper when playing at this level.
Also, imagine when their IT bill goes up by $100M because of additional support calls due to Linux oddities.
75M is not a lot for important productivity software that people use all day.
Instead let's make a one time hardware purchase, with warranty for parts, and handle the software in house with FOSS.