This is the blog of Adam Kalsey. Unusual depth and complexity. Rich, full body with a hint of nutty earthiness.
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28 Nov 2006
I was accepted into Sun’s Startup Essentials program today (nearly a month after I applied). As promised, I’m blogging the pricing.
The discounts on hardware are pretty good. There’s one low-end server that has no discount, but most products are in the 30%-50% off range. One server, a $70k behemoth, is a whopping 66% off.
Only servers and workstations are offered as part of the program. If you’re getting a workstation, you can add on things like monitors at a discount, but you can’t buy the monitors directly. That’s too bad, because a $995 24-inch LCD is only $470 under the program. Sun should consider selling these by themselves. What a great branding win it would be to have developers at startups everywhere sitting behind dual 24inch monitors staring at a Sun logo all day.
Enough analysis; here’s the pricing.
I’m not including all the specs below; the specs that are included are there just to help differentiate between two systems of the same name. I’m also not including all the configuration options. You can add things like keyboards and monitors, but not change hard drives and RAM.
There may be typos in the table below—I transcribed it by hand. So these prices may not be 100% accurate and of course Sun might change them at any time. In any event, this price list should be enough to give you an idea of what you can get under the program and the types of discounts you’ll see.
| Product | Retail | Startup | Discount |
| Sun Fire X2100 M2 Server 1.8GHz | $945.00 | $945.00 | 0.00% |
| Sun Fire X2100 M2 Server 2.2GHz | $1,645.00 | $1,245.00 | 24.32% |
| Sun Fire X2100 M2 Server 2.6GHz | $2,795.00 | $1,865.00 | 33.27% |
| Sun Fire X2200 M2 Server 1.8GHz | $1,595.00 | $1,375.00 | 13.79% |
| Sun Fire X2200 M2 Server 2.2GHz | $3,295.00 | $2,295.00 | 30.35% |
| Sun Fire X2200 M2 Server 2.6GHz | $5,895.00 | $4,095.00 | 30.53% |
| Sun Fire X4100 M2 Server 1.8GHz | $2,595.00 | $2,385.00 | 8.09% |
| Sun Fire X4100 M2 Server 2.4GHz | $5,795.00 | $3,945.00 | 31.92% |
| Sun Fire X4100 M2 Server 2.6GHz | $7,995.00 | $5,605.00 | 29.89% |
| Sun Fire X4100 M2 Server 2.8GHz | $9,395.00 | $5,910.00 | 37.09% |
| Sun Fire X4200 M2 Server 1.8GHz | $2,995.00 | $2,400.00 | 19.87% |
| Sun Fire X4200 M2 Server 2.4GHz | $7,795.00 | $5,365.00 | 31.17% |
| Sun Fire X4200 M2 Server 2.8GHz | $9,795.00 | $5,950.00 | 39.25% |
| Sun Fire X4200 M2 Server 1.8GHz | $13,895.00 | $9,360.00 | 32.64% |
| Sun Fire X4500 Server 2.6GHz | $69,995.00 | $24,000.00 | 65.71% |
| Sun Fire X4600 M2 Server 4x2.6GHz | $27,995.00 | $15,245.00 | 45.54% |
| Sun Fire X4600 M2 Server 8x2.6GHz | $51,995.00 | $25,395.00 | 51.16% |
| Sun Fire T1000 Server 2GB RAM | $3,995.00 | $2,420.00 | 39.42% |
| Sun Fire T1000 Server 6 Core 8GB RAM | $6,445.00 | $3,470.00 | 46.16% |
| Sun Fire T1000 Server 8 Core 8GB RAM | $9,945.00 | $5,795.00 | 41.73% |
| Sun Fire T1000 Server 8 Core 16GB RAM | $14,445.00 | $8,200.00 | 43.23% |
| Sun Fire T2000 Server 6 Core | $11,885.00 | $5,235.00 | 55.95% |
| Sun Fire T2000 Server 8 Core 8GB RAM | $14,595.00 | $7,100.00 | 51.35% |
| Sun Fire T2000 Server 8 Core 16GB RAM | $18,545.00 | $8,430.00 | 54.54% |
| Sun Fire T2000 Server 8 Core 32GB RAM | $29,445.00 | $13,245.00 | 55.02% |
| Sun Ultra 25 Workstation, XVR-300 | $2,895.00 | $2,200.00 | 24.01% |
| Sun Ultra 25 Workstation, XVR-2500 | $3,995.00 | $2,675.00 | 33.04% |
| Sun Ultra 45 Workstation, XVR-300 | $3,695.00 | $2,405.00 | 34.91% |
| Sun Ultra 45 Workstation, XVR-2500 | $4,595.00 | $2,880.00 | 37.32% |
| Sun Ultra 45 Workstation, XVR-300,2GB | $6,795.00 | $3,010.00 | 55.70% |
| Sun Ultra 20 M2 Workstation, 512MB RAM | $995.00 | $890.00 | 10.55% |
| Sun Ultra 20 M2 Workstation, 1GB RAM | $1,495.00 | $1,250.00 | 16.39% |
| Sun Ultra 20 M2 Workstation, 2GB RAM | $2,795.00 | $1,915.00 | 31.48% |
| Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation, Model 2210 | $2,795.00 | $1,665.00 | 40.43% |
| Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation, Model 2214 | $6,295.00 | $4,225.00 | 32.88% |
| Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation, Model 2218 | $14,195.00 | $8,885.00 | 37.41% |
This program is available to US startups only. Companies that purchase must have fewer than 150 employees and have been in business less than 4 years. There's a cap of $150k per year you can spend on the program. All the details of how to participate and who's eligible are here: http://www.sun.com/emrkt/startupessentials/
Adam, Thanks for the info. When I worked at Sun the standard business model included something like a 35% discount to account for OEM and large volume customer sales. That was almost 10 years ago, so maybe it has changed. If something like that is still the case, a lot of those discounts aren't that special. Yet better than nothing.
Sun hardware is reliable and prices are good.
I also like Sun hardware, their servers have never disappointed me. They seem to be offering some nice discounts. Maybe I even buy something...
Sun Ultra 45 Workstation, XVR-300,2GB for only $3,010.00 is an amazing offer.
We're all set-up with Sun's Startup Essentials program now and it seriously couldn't have come at a better time. Everyone on here is right, the pricing is amazing, the help is really thorough and I have a feeling Sun knows that they're leading the pack with this offering.
What is you buy the product and your business goes bad and you resell the equipment before your year is up?
I am also curious to John's question. What if within a year things (especially in this economy) go bad. You are unable to return the equipment. In order to get back previous money spent to start your business you resell the product to help out your situation. What can happen really?
Adam, This is great pricing. Do you happen to have an update on this pricing list?
This discussion has been closed.
dennis
November 29, 2006 1:44 AM
Great move, great prices. Are those available in germany as well?