Adobe announces the End of Life for Business Catalyst

[MagdaN]

Adobe is committed to delivering exceptional software and services to our customers. It’s in our nature to innovate and try new things, and it was in this spirit that we acquired Business Catalyst in 2009. As we re-focus on products that broadly provide our customers with the most value, Adobe is announcing the end of development for Business Catalyst as of March 26th, 2018. New sites will no longer be available for purchase starting with June 18th, 2018. 

Adobe will stop hosting existing sites on Business Catalyst on March 26th 2020. Adobe encourages customers to download their data and migrate to other systems well before March 26th 2020. Detailed how-to information and assistance is available. Customers' data will be retained by Adobe until March 26th 2020, after which date the data will be deleted. Data retention is for the sole purpose of allowing customers to export their data and transfer to another platform.   

We thank our Business Catalyst users and want to help them make a smooth transition to a third-party service. Please see the following for more information on transitioning:  https://secure.worldsecuresystems.com/product-announcement

Please see below a detailed FAQ.

Why is Adobe discontinuing Business Catalyst?

Adobe is committed to delivering exceptional software and services to our customers. It’s in our nature to innovate and try new things, and it was in this spirit that we acquired Business Catalyst in 2009. As we re-focus on products that broadly provide our customers with the most value, we are now announcing the end of life for Business Catalyst. We thank our Business Catalyst users and want to help them make a smooth transition to a third party service.

When will the End of Life take effect?

On March 26th, 2020.

Will this end-of-service affect paid sites as well?

Yes, all sites, including trial and paid sites, partner sites, etc. will be affected by the end of life.

Will data be available for download beyond the service end date?

1. No. Data will be deleted. We encourage users to download their data before the service end date.

I need help downloading my data. Whom can I contact for help?

BC users may find export instructions in the Business Catalyst Help and Support pages. If you still have questions, please contact our Customer Support team.

How long do I have to export my data?

All Business Catalyst servers will be taken down on March 26th, 2020, after which all customer data will be deleted. Please export your data before March 26th, 2020.

How long will you keep my data? What will you do with it?

We will retain your data until March 26th, 2020 or until you delete your site, whichever is sooner, so that you can transition to another product.

Do you recommend another product for me to use?

While there are other hosting solutions available in the market, Adobe does not recommend a specific product. For basic websites and Creative Cloud users, we provide documentation to help with transition to GoDaddy, should the customer choose this replacement. Moreover, since we’ve seen the emergence of Do-It-Yourself (DIY) website creators that leverage customizable templates to quickly create responsive websites, Adobe is making our own investment in the DIY space and welcomes all interested customers to join our upcoming pre-release program for a new format that will be introduced later this year as part of Adobe Spark.

Will new features be developed?

No, new features will no longer be developed on Business Catalyst. We are maintaining a small team to correct critical issues, but no new work is being done. The Business Catalyst team will maintain the PCI and GDPR compliance throughout the lifetime of the product and develop any new features needed in this respect.

Will Adobe still fix the bugs in Business Catalyst?

We will continue to repair critical issues (related to security, payments or customer data for example) when they appear, however, the work will be limited to bugs that have a high security or high stability risk. We will not be fixing minor items with small impact or that have a workaround which can be used.

Will my site be closed down?

At this time, all sites will continue to be live and the public will see no difference in your site. However, starting with March 26th, 2020 all sites will no longer be live and they will not be accessible either to the general public, or to the site administrators. Please find an alternative platform for your site and data before this date.

Can I continue creating trial sites?

You can continue creating trial sites until June 18^th, 2018. They need to be upgraded to a paid plan before June 18^th, 2018. The data from these sites, as well as from any other site in your portfolio, needs to be removed from the platform before March 26th, 2020.

Can I upgrade my trial site to paid?

You can continue upgrading trial sites to paid until June 18^th, 2018, but the data from these sites, as well as from any other site in your portfolio needs to be removed from the platform before March 26th, 2020.

Can I downgrade my site or make any other plan changes?

Yes, you can continue making any changes to your site plan and extras until March 26th, 2020.

Can I still purchase extras?

You can continue purchasing extras until March 26th, 2020. Please note that all extras expire on March 26th, 2020 and can no longer be used after that date.

Can I continue sending newsletters?

The e-mail marketing features will continue to work for the duration of your site. You can continue sending emails until March 26th, 2020 at which point all newsletter credits remaining in your account will expire.

Can I still redeem my commissions?

You can continue to redeem the commissions available in your account until March 26^th 2020.  Following this date this feature will not be available anymore.

What happens to the commissions below $500?

At this time, we are researching technical options to allow redemption of lower commissions. Please stay tuned for further announcements from the Business Catalyst team.

Can I extend the validity of my extras beyond March 26th, 2020?

No, the validity date for your extras can no longer be extended. All extras not used until March 26^th 2020 will be forfeited.

Will I be able to use Adobe Muse or Dreamweaver to update my site?

Yes, until March 26th, 2020, if your desktop app still functions properly.

Will I still have technical support for Adobe Business Catalyst?

Yes, until March 26th, 2020. However, after June 18^th, 2018, our support team will give a higher priority to cases about the off the platform migration questions, in addition to critical security, compliance, and availability issues.

[C9-MB]

Adobe are only likely to reconsider the EOL and EOS dates, if the cost of extending them is less than the cost not to, and tinkering with details such as commissions is unlikely to do it.

This is perhaps where an organised class-action threat may be of some use, give them pause to consider, and an argument to present.

[Liam Dilley]

Please do not guess at stuff.

Original announcement time was 15 months, it is now already longer then that. Do you think Adobe did that just by themselves?

There are several long standing and senior partners for BC that have and do a lot you may not be aware of.

[C9-MB]

What?

[Liam Dilley]

"Adobe are only likely to reconsider the EOL and EOS dates, if the cost of extending them is less than the cost not to, and tinkering with details such as commissions is unlikely to do it."

You are off the mark in this area.

[C9-MB]

FFS Liam, stop it with the self-appointed arbiter of what people should/not say.

If partners want Adobe to pay attention, then my experience in dealing with large corporates is that they only change decisions like these based on the bottom line – cost of litigation, cost of bad PR, rate right up there. Tinkering with commissions... not so LIKELY.

The FACTS are that there is an announcement of EOL and EOS that is unworkably short for the majority of partners. I don’t give a rat’s if it was only 15mths, it’s still too damned short for the rest of us, and I can assure you that’s no F*ing guess.

[Liam Dilley]

I am under an Adobe NDA and a BC NDA So I have to always be careful.

I am one of a number of partners within the PAB - Partner advisory board, FAR FAR from being self-appointed.

I have been both an advocate for the BC community for a long time and I have helped Adobe and tried to help the BC team for a long time to improve and drive BC further.
Me and Brett for example have even gone out to Romania where the BC team were to help BC be better.

In terms of the deadlines. Yes they were short, it was shorter, for some of the larger ones like Pretty you think those times are not even more of a nightmare?
Both me and Brett along with other PAB partners or leading partners have been doing A LOT for EVERYONE in the last few weeks in many avenues to try and make this outcome as best as it can be with this Adobe announcement.

Saying things about not caring about 15 months... Sorry BUT YES YOU WOULD! of course you would. I was being told directly by many partners how that pretty much was going to kill their business. The time now is still too short and Adobe has been told of this, been told the stories, given discussions and more around all this OF COURSE They have! But its better then it was and to say otherwise would be completely insane.

Poor attitude and just complaints on a forum honestly leads to nothing. For me going through your recent posts I honestly do not see anything constructive.

[Peter-AM]

It is my belief now that your inner council under an NDA etc was not in the best interest of the general community of partners. Not saying that you worked against partners, but the inner circle being shrouded in the cover of an NDA was just a gag document.

I remember when Adobe wanted partners to join and they grabbed everyone by the balls who joined. The water tank has been poisoned and now it is just a matter of time to watch Partners reserves become depleted.

[Liam Dilley]

Conspiracy forming now?

You going there?

There has been a Partner Advisory Board working to better things for the community for a VERY long time. Before that it was Senior partners spending HOURS of their business and personal time for the same end. Naturally they know and see things early and with ANY sort of thing like that you will be bound my agreements.

Honestly, focus on solving and working on the real problems and your business and know others are doing the same not only for themselves but for everyone else. I am shattered for all the stuff I am doing for people like you as well as company directly in last few weeks. I saddens me to see some clearly not grateful for people like myself and their efforts over the years.

I will not respond any further to not derail this thread further and I hope you can do the same.

[Peter-AM]

Well Liam

"There has been a Partner Advisory Board working to better things for the community for a VERY long time."

that didn't go very well then did it. When you look back you will see they screwed you into a corner and closed the door.

Yes I am off now too, have a great weekend

[Liam Dilley]

You not been involved in the community and clearly do not know what BC would have been or if it would have died sooner or anything. There is way to many theories here and not much facts going around. All I am telling people is to stick to facts not fiction.
I gone from being accused of just pretending to be someone in the community from people that have not been involved in it at all to realising I have been to then switching tact and then being accused of  being involved in conspiracies and then being moaned at, nay insulted for helping the platform be better.

This is far from professionalism as you can get.

[Fubals]

The facts are... ADOBE doesn't care.

[SarahSYS1]

How likely is it that at least the 2 year EOL will be extended?

This is the main issue for me, 4 years would allow a website to have a good lifespan.

Out of the 200 websites that we oversee, there are a lot which happily look after themselves and do not require any kind of tech support.

The other biggest issue I have is our biggest client has a lot of customer accounts on the website. We stayed with BC for the sole reason that we need to keep these usernames/passwords. Is there any way of retaining these for a migration to another platform?

Also, any chance of a response from someone at BC RE: some of our questions??

[IAMTEEJAY]

Hear, hear on the 4-year cycle. Naturally, that seems to the be the turnover rate for satisfied clients and there sites. I am developing an exit strategic and fee structure for all my clients, but save those in production. These I was just going to transfer them at 1/2 price within the next 1-1/2, but with a 4-year extension, they will probably accept a full transfer charge.

[C9-MB]

Seriously Liam, I really don’t care about what you have or haven’t done in the past, because if we consider this as ground-zero, then none of what came before now counts for anything.

All I care about is the problem Adobe have created, as it is NOW, and how to deal with both it and the fall-out from it.

It’s only what we do next that matters, because we don’t have the luxury of time to reflect on the history of the product’s development and various people’s contributions to it.

As I said, I don’t care if it would have been 15mths and is now 24mths, because that doesn’t make the situation appreciably better for the small partner with many clients. The existential threat to their business is essentially the same, and Adobe should not be given any brownie-points for increasing the EOL from insane to ridiculous, and should be given no leeway on a 12week EOS notice, which is unconscionable given the partner relationship.

I believe that it should be 2years to EOS and 4years to EOL, in line with the sort of notice companies such as Microsoft would typically provide on Line-of-Business products, but others may disagree. However, regardless of what the ‘correct’ values are, my view is quite simply that if it takes the threat or commencement of class-action litigation to get Adobe’s attention, so be it.

I also don’t believe my suggestion that Adobe would not likely be influenced to change their decision if the commissions were tinkered with, was particularly outlandish or warranted your rebuke – or are you perhaps suggesting that they would?

I don’t mind if you think my posts are not constructive or demonstrate a ‘poor attitude’, as that’s entirely your prerogative, but I really DO mind when I am told what I can or can-not say, particularly given the lack of input from Adobe. Clearly that was reflected in my previous post – something I should have perhaps not posted while still so annoyed.

If you are under Adobe NDA and can’t contribute, then people will understand if you don’t post anything. But to sit there and criticize others who are not privy to the details you seem to indicate you are, and who are thus forced to guess and hypothesize, is just a bit rich – so please stop it.

So, how about you just allow people to vent and express their anger, thoughts, opinions, suggestions, and discuss the problem they are now confronted with, as forums are intended to.

[Liam Dilley]

Mike, sorry to hear how angry you are on things, you not been part of the community and that is a shame.

I suggest joining either the facebook group or slack groups (which have been linked here) to get a better idea of what the BC community is doing. They actually looking at solutions, engaging with Adobe etc in a constructive way.

A lot of your issues are around that you are not across everything going on because your on the outside here.

[Peter-AM]

@Liam

You're a freak'n sanctimonious ....,

You stick your nose in over and over, what is a Senior Partner?

Original partners joined in approx 2006 including me, and there is no such option / designation of Senior Partner. So please remain accurate to the facts as you so sanctimoniously and succinctly mention over and over
  "There are several long standing and senior partners for BC that have and do a lot you may not be aware of" - Fan Boys with own agendas perhaps / possibly not even a real Premium partner .

Personally don't give a crap, I am not exposed like some others, but Liam your interference and infringement as a self appointed pseudo senior partner has been part of the problem in getting Adobe staff to take responsibility over the years since acquiring BC, you have continuously jumped in and played interference over and over and what did that amount to when it comes to Adobe EOL'ing BC.

It would be hilarious if you are just a Partner staffer or contractor and got away with that to become Senior Partner, if so congratulations.

[Peter-AM]

BTW Liam,
are you an actual current Adobe Business Partner, or do you just work for / or contract to a Partner?

[Liam Dilley]

I am a partner in my own write and I work at Pretty for Brett who is also a partner.

I am also an Adobe MVP and ACP

[pjwright77]

Listen guys no offence but at one time Liam and i had close to 1500 BC clients between us i built over 700 of them myself, we used to travel to San Jose to help train partners & fly economy 15hrs LOL, we have put in 1000's upon 1000's of of our own time into this product, many of your coding fixes BC Apps and patches you have used over the years chances are one of us wrote that for you the partners, to help grow the community. i get it everyone's frankly pissed off but Liam is looking out for you guys same as he always has & it is his job to moderate this forum which he does for free i might add no one pays him for it. and yes just to state a fact Senior Partner is a BC role there was also Mater Partner as well there was even a BC Certified Developer when the BC Apps first came out which you had to be to develop BC Apps, i was also the lead developer of a Master Partner Studio for 6 years i still have the shirt and marketing materials LOL. So just to make things all clear OK guys lets not split hairs over BS guys like Liam, Brett & myself want to help you and will fight for you i promise you that and if we can save the product we will do it if we can, and if we have to move all your sites to other platforms well hell we will do that too for you, Like I said in my other post I am here to help you guys I don't even build BC currently because of my commitment to Envato & Elegant themes takes up all my time building WordPress Plugins, and i have taken time off that to be here for you guys anyway i can and i know Liam personally i guarantee you he is doing the same   

[Peter-AM]

That is my point, playing rescuers and letting the people responsible not even want to reply or address the Elephant in the room is the bloody problem here.

How do THEY (Adobe managers) expect partners to ... , is a legit question

Not once has an Adobe Team member expressed a how plan, but said they would help ...

Someone needs to understand modern negotiation and also not interfere constantly, especially if they are just an employee of a Partner. What they have achieved is basically zero and gave the Adobe team no need to reply over and over again. Adobe managers probably laugh when they see Liam start another semantics skirmish. A paid partner is a formal partner of Adobe, now someone who did some smart coding for a place they work at is a tech head doing someone elses daily grind, and if they gave code away they are just stupid. To infer they are a Senior Partner is just BULLSHIT!

Again moderatiing an "Adobe Forum" is taking the responsibility out of Adobe managers hands. FFS why do that!

I don't want anyone "fighting for me", thanks for the unsolicited offer, that is not how a negotiation works now days. Rapport and trust are the seed to a great outcome and unfortunately Liam's sanctimonious attitude steam rollers to the point of pissing people off and blocks dialogue with the people it is most directed at.

Will be interesting to see what coming weeks bring, enjoy the weekend.

[Liam Dilley]

I am disappointed that the anger with the Adobe announcement is being pushed to other people. To think no one here have similar and the same problems is pretty silly. Everyone here is on the same sinking Adobe BC boat.

I have only moderated the spam sales of migrations where its been the same person 10 times posting the same thing here. Nothing else, I do not appreciate being accused of doing otherwise, again the anger is real but direct it into the right location.

Making assumptions as a few people here is my entire point at the moment, You have made several here not knowing who I am and showing your BC partner age as it were. A lot of what your using in BC comes from hours of even MY OWN FREE TIME working with engineers etc like some other partners have. There is actual lots me in BC and there is only a handful of other people who have put more into BC then me and I work for one of them.

As I mentioned, as a result of a lot of that work I like others are under various legal and NDA agreements with Adobe so there is always a controlled amount of what I am ever allowed to say vs what I know.

- Are you?

- Can you say how some of the webapp functionality is directly as a result of your work?

- You know A LOT of the current documentation has been updated, supported, fixed and changed as a result of yourself?

- How some people know some BC features etc, how to not be get spammed on forms without captcha and many other things, did you do that?

- Have you done double figure skype calls from home at 10pm, 1am, 2am with BC engineers and team members to help them and thus help the entire BC community?

Cool if you have, but I do not think you have have you?

I can keep going but there is no point for the tit for tat, I have hardly said anything here other then for people to stay on target, not assume anything and be constructive and there is a couple of you directing your anger in the wrong places. Stay profesional guys, there are some hard long months ahead for ALL OF US!

[Peter-AM]

Liam I did no development of webapps etc that you mention. More fool you for doing so for free, do you want a medal. It was Adobe's platform and I will say again your action to rescue and build stuff for free contributed to digging an even deeper black hole for partners. Adobe managers had responsibility to the product and stood by laughing at others stupid enough to invest time and energy to create a quicksand for their peers. Where did it lead to in the end?

The cliche of it's not personal it's just business is BS. There are plenty of partners and staff that have been personally effected since this announcement and the horizon is looking grim for them,staff and families so it is VERY PERSONAL and Adobe managers should be more compassionate, it is just decisions after all and anything can be re-framed with desired intent.

[pjwright77]

I sincerely apologize for the "Unsolicited offer" Peter that was not my intent at all and you are dead right mate rapport and trust are the seed to a great outcome (great quote by the way) I just want all the partners to know that I am here at your disposal if you need a person with my skill set, which i imagine at least some of you will in coming months even if we get a favorable outcome, i loved my time working as a developer with the BC community you are a great bunch of people & i would still be here full time if the BC partner i was employed by had not been sold.

[Peter-AM]

Thanks PJ, I just hope for the partners that are in deep trouble that they can find some solace soon. If someone from Adobe would just interact with some genuine guidance and real understanding (not LIAM) it will create a healing process and then some magic can result.

Like you as I can clearly see that you genuinely care also. I am not a coder techie, but I know about outcomes and without quality dialogue with the other party (Adobe Managers) nothing of benefit will result. Hopefully that will occur very soon before the end account subscribers get phase 2 notifications.

Have a great weekend, here's to a new week with a settled climate. And thank you for the hand out gesture to all.

[pjwright77]

It's a Shame but not unexpected, i have seen the migration of my partner portal clients to other platforms gradually since Resigning from Design Experts as Lead BC developer a few years ago. there is a lot more products now competing for the same market share & the open source products like WordPress have vastly improved over the last few years & with plugins like WOO & DIVI added to the product, clients get a 90% built eCommerce package that's mobile first, a visual page builder that can build any type of page layout including complex web-apps using a GUI alone and no code in most cases. and then there are the commercial competing programs such as Shopify, WIX, BigCommerce, Squareup, even Telco's & hosting companies like Go Daddy & Telstra are offering smart web-apps & portals to their clients at affordable rates. then there is modern hosting platforms as well things like Virtual Private Servers, Cloud platforms such as AWS, Google Cloud ECT they are now very affordable, powerful & secure. gone are the days of the budget shared web hosting servers that were slow & left you venerable to security exploits from not only your software but every other user sharing the server i am sure every web developer reading this has had to clean up more than one of those messy malware storms over their career.

it is a disappointing result but the investment Adobe would have to make to get BC up to the standard needed to be competitive in the current market would most likely cost more than the product earns, i'm sure its more complicated than that but i would say that's a huge factor.

For all the BC partners here that don't have a senior developer on staff don't panic there are still plenty of us around the community i know Liam has a vast knowledge of other web / cloud platforms i could not say for certain what his plans are but i imagine Pretty will have a plan for migrating BC clients if they do definitely see what they have to offer, I have worked with Liam & Brett @ Pretty in the past they are a great group to work with & the products & services they deliver are top quality.

another school of thought is can we as BC Dev's & Partners get the BC source code from Adobe ? not sure what we would need to do to make that happen and if its even possible or viable Liam would know more than I on that but i think BC is just .NET MSSQL based if memory serves.

I will be offering site migrations & hosting plans for any Business Catalyst Product Owners looking to migrate, WordPress, Drupal & Shopify are my specialty my operation is much smaller however I am happy to help out the BC Partners anyway i can, i have been a BC developer since the early days and can definitely offer you a range of solutions & I am currently taking on new clients if you need something more permanent I will do my best to ensure you guys get looked after the BC community has been very good to me over the years and im happy to help any of you anyway i can