Microsoft is giving big customers discounts of up to a quarter on licensing of major server and communications software in an apparent reaction to the recession.

Customers on its Enterprise Agreement (EA) volume-licensing contracts have been given until July 3 to claim a 25 per cent discount on its licensing and Software Assurance (SA). Microsoft's volume licensing agreements target organizations with more than 250 PCs while SA runs in three-year cycles.

The company's also offering 15 per cent off licensing and SA of Exchange Server Standard, Office Communication Server Standard, SQL Server Standard, Office SharePoint Server, Visual Studio Team Suite, Office Project Standard, Office Project Professional, Office Visio Standard and Office Visio Professional.

Separately, Microsoft has released a set of eight extensions to its Dynamics customer relationship management (CRM) software that are free for download. The Dynamics CRM Accelerators have been released under a Microsoft open-source license and cover - among other things - analytics, notifications, enterprise search and event management.

The downloads and price cuts come in the midst of Microsoft's online and TV-based advertising campaign encouraging business customers to continue their spending on software during the recession, rather than cut back.®

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