Many businesses would (and do) pay when approached by the vendor. If the business depends on a specific application, it's providing them with value, they've invested in processes around the use of the application, etc., it is hard to switch to an alternative (free or paid). Keep in mind that when the business made the original decision to use that application, it had all of the other free/unlicensed alternatives to choose from as well. Of course, businesses do switch applications over time, but there can be significant cost to doing so (time, effort, training, new/revised processes, etc.)
This type of data is critical to software vendors confronting unlicensed use of their products. Trying to attack the piracy distribution channels can only yield Pyrrhic victories, but identifying the businesses that are actually using software without paying for it gives vendors the data they need to make the most informed decisions on how to address the problem.
Vendors can analyze the data and see which geographies require a stronger presence, the actual size of their piracy problem, the license revenue recovery opportunity, which businesses they should pursue for license revenue recovery, etc.
If a business is using unlicensed software it has made a decision that of all the solutions on the market ("free" or not), this one works best for them - they are a customer in every sense of the word except the most obvious: they haven't paid for it. If vendors can identify these businesses, they can reach out and offer them a real customer relationship complete with support, training, feature requests, and other added value.
I've blogged about this here - please let me know what you think:
http://www.vilabs.com/blog/software-piracy-lemonade-part-2/
Michael Goff
V.i. Labs
www.vilabs.com
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