It’s a business decision of course. Forge your own path or be beholden to your revenue model dictated by AWS.

Big Enterprise will not require billing through AWS (disclaimer: employed at a large enterprise, buying ~$900k software license currently). They’ll have an accounts payable department, a procurement process, and someone to cut a check or ACH to Elastic monthly/annually.

It wasn't the way they did billing, it was just an option. One they've removed. I get it, I'm just saying it cost them some money.

I totally get that. I don't dispute that. But if you must choose between "please sir, can I have some more?" and controlling your own revenue destiny, it is clear why some would choose the later.

Would you want to be beholden to AWS' whims? You might as well be a Walmart supplier at that point, constantly dragged out to Bentonville having to make your case for every penny of your costs. Amazon has proven its model (all about scale), how it operates (your margin = our opportunity), and you partner with them at your own peril.

I'm suggesting the thought process to shift from, "Ahhh, those Elastic guys and their bad decisions!" to "Hmm, well, tough decision to make [forgoing revenue through AWS] but I understand why they made it".

I had already acknowledged that though.

My apologies then; I did not pick up on that from your comments.