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Platform Strategy

Trimble Cloud Core Platform Approach to End-of-Life Products

Author(s): Courtney Burnett, Program Manager, Data

Peer Reviewers(s):

  • David Kohler, VP, Core Platform
  • Jared Bloch, Sr. Director, Core Platform
  • Kim Tomasak, Portfolio Manager
  • Devon Sparks, Trimble Distinguished Engineer

Last Reviewed: September 2024

Why End-of-Life?

In certain circumstances, shutting down a product or service is necessary. In most cases, we move a product towards End-of-Life for one of three reasons: a new and more efficient product or service, minimal usage, or a substantial and unavoidable security concern.

Migration to Newer Product

If Cloud Core Platform has stood up a new and improved product that supports the same, or similar, use case we may move an existing product towards End-of-Life. The duplication of services is costly to Trimble, time-consuming for Cloud Core Platform, and does not provide benefit to the business.

Minimal Usage

If the cost to run a product outweighs the business value, Cloud Core Platform may consider End-of-Life. Cloud Core Platform will work alongside the business to understand their use case and the risk they would assume by proceeding with a shutdown. If there is still a significant individual need by a single product team, Cloud Core Platform may also consider moving the service to ownership by that team.

Security Concerns

In the unlikely event that a security concern cannot be resolved and is causing a significant risk to Trimble, Cloud Core Platform may consider End-of-Life. In this situation, timelines for End-of-Life care may be tighter and less flexible. Cloud Core Platform will work alongside the business to understand their use case and the risk they would assume by Cloud Core Platform proceeding with a shutdown. In certain circumstances, if there is still a significant need for the product, Cloud Core Platform may also consider the migration approach.

Cost of End-of-Life Postponement

Actual Cost

Postponing the shutdown of services has significant cost implications. Cost is directly affected by the continuation of infrastructure costs, maintenance costs and, in many cases, contractual costs.

Consider a common scenario: A Trimble product team has a legacy product (SKU) out in the market that still generates revenue. While the top line (revenue) is visible, bottom-line reassessments of legacy products are rarely done, and it proves difficult to map platform operational costs directly to product margin. While costs for the individual product team may be low, the total cost to Trimble to maintain horizontal platform services for one or a few product lines is costly.

Hidden Cost

Resource allocation

By postponing shutdown, team members must remain allocated to the product, which impacts resourcing availability for other priorities.

Cybersecurity and Privacy

Aging codebases and infrastructure introduce additional security risk over time. Furthermore, the cybersecurity and data privacy landscape is changing quickly; legacy services must be considered as new policies and regulations emerge.

Fractured platform and confusion

Legacy services introduce additional integration paths for Product teams. In many cases, the Platform strategy appears confusing to teams, such as, “Which service do I use? This one or that one?” Maintaining documentation and a clear adoption strategy becomes challenging. In the worst case, when data resides across multiple systems, Trimble’s ability to have full visibility across those resources is reduced. In practical terms, fractured systems impact user experience as identities, accounts, and data are spread across multiple systems and user experiences.

Cloud Core Platform’s Approach

Cloud Core Platform’s first step in considering End-of-Life is to evaluate the product and our platform strategy fully. We consider the total cost of the product, its business value, how the product aligns to Trimble’s strategy, security risks, and how we can support the business requirements within our other products. Based on the outcome of our evaluation, we may determine that End-of-Life is the best approach for Trimble as a whole.

Trimble Cloud Core Platform has a product lifecycle with the following stages. Lifecycle statuses can be found on our documentation site, https://docs.trimblecloud.com. If a service has no lifecycle specified, it should be assumed to be a Current Version open for adoption.

Preview

  • The service is available to early adopters in a preview environment. Based on early validation, changes to the interface contract may occur.

Current Version

  • The service is in a growth or mature stage. The service is stable and doors are open for broad adoption.

Deprecated

  • No new software features are added.
  • Critical bug fixes, security patches, and documentation continue to be supported.
  • New API subscriptions must be manually approved.

End-of-Life

  • All service endpoints, data, and documentation will be shut down on the listed date.

Trimble Cloud intends to reduce product lifecycle impacts to integrators by communicating early and often with the following program approach:

Phase 1: Communicate Intent & Conduct Discovery

  • Cloud Core Platform communicates our plans to End-of-Life the product. We aim to work alongside integrators from the beginning so that this change will be as least impactful as possible. During this phase, Cloud Core Platform will conduct discovery efforts to capture use cases and usage patterns.

Phase 2: Communicate Deprecation Plan

  • Cloud Core Platform will communicate the plan to deprecate the product. With deprecation, there will be no development toward the product. Maintenance activities for critical and high-priority vulnerability patches will be maintained until the product is fully End-of-Life.

Phase 3: When Applicable; Communicate Adoption Availability

  • If a product is being End-of-Life because a newer product provides support for the same use cases then Cloud Core Platform will communicate when adoption of the newer product will be available. Cloud Core Platform will work alongside integrators to plan for a seamless migration

Phase 4: Communicate End-of-Life Timeline and Shutdown

  • Cloud Core Platform will communicate End-of-Life timelines. We will provide a minimum of six months notice. By the communicated End-of-Life date, all traffic must be moved off the product.

Integrators can expect information regarding End-of-Life to be communicated via the Cloud Core Platform monthly news emails. We will also collaborate with integrators one-on-one throughout the four phases to ensure we remain closely aligned.

Conclusion

Product End-of-Life is a complex process, so we are mindful when making the decision to End-of-Life products. Our goals are to not impact the business, stay aligned with integrators from start to finish, and overall align to Trimble’s long-term goals.