As alternative tools like Ghidra or even some of the cheaper options like Hopper become more popular, I suspect Hex-Rays recognizes that corporate licenses are their bread and butter. From a business perspective it makes sense to squeeze as much out of these companies as they can get away with. The subscription costs are only a fraction of an annual salary.
Unfortunately this leaves the hobbyist and individuals behind. ~$1K/year isn't out of the realm of what I pay for other tools, but it's really hard to justify it when I can open Ghidra and get 95% of the way there without the subscription model.
IDA really is great for handling edge cases and obscure architectures, but I hope this last switch-up by Hex-Rays pushes even more developer attention toward improving the open-source alternatives.
Unfortunately this leaves the hobbyist and individuals behind. ~$1K/year isn't out of the realm of what I pay for other tools, but it's really hard to justify it when I can open Ghidra and get 95% of the way there without the subscription model.
IDA really is great for handling edge cases and obscure architectures, but I hope this last switch-up by Hex-Rays pushes even more developer attention toward improving the open-source alternatives.