End of Life for Medical Mobile App (Stand Alone Software)

[AKRegulatory]

I am looking for guidance on defining end of life for a medical mobile app. How do you define shelf life for standalone software that doesn't have an end of life? Does it have to be predefined? In which case can we assign a random 100 year lifetime to it?

 

[mihzago]

do you plan to support the software for 100 years? if not, then better you not define it so.

It's up to you to define what is the life of the product.
I typically do 2 or 3 years for each major release e.g. 1.0, 2.0, etc.
Which means that I will support version 1.x for at least 2 or 3 years; after that the customer has 3 options: upgrade, stop using the 1.x version, or deal with whatever issues arise after support ends.

Think of Windows 2000 or XP, which are no longer supported.

 

[Marcelo]

 

[Michael Malis]

do you plan to support the software for 100 years? if not, then better you not define it so.

It's up to you to define what is the life of the product.
I typically do 2 or 3 years for each major release e.g. 1.0, 2.0, etc.
Which means that I will support version 1.x for at least 2 or 3 years; after that the customer has 3 options: upgrade, stop using the 1.x version, or deal with whatever issues arise after support ends.

Think of Windows 2000 or XP, which are no longer supported.

Just one clarification - you should define UPFRONT what is the life of the product. This way customer has the right expectations. If you did not do it upfront, please clarify as soon as possible.

 

[AKRegulatory]

Thank you Marcelo and Michael. Could you please elaborate? I understand the need to define lifetime of the product but at what stage does the lifetime have to be defined?

Since our product has just been commercialized, would it be adequate to say something to the effect of "Products reach the end of their product lifecycle as changes occur in market demand, technology innovation, new product development, or simply when a product ages and is replaced by a richer technology. When rendering a product or release obsolete, the company follows a formal process, starting with a product obsolescence announcement including the effective date of obsolescence (24 months from the date of announcement), the date of final order acceptance and the support end date."

Is product warranty information useful?

Thanks again for the guidance.

 

[c.mitch]

Hi,
Software doesn't wear or rust. Its end of life is an arbitrary decision of the manufacturer. Thus it is up to you to define the life of your software.
It's common that the software lifetime stems from the hardware or OS lifetime.
But as I already said, lifetime can be a fully arbitrary management decision. Eg the manufacturer decides to support software for 3 years.
Besides that a system of time limited licenses allow to control the use of software after lifetime expiration.
Hope it helps.