[4] The highest-risk definition of shelfware is security software, purchased to fill an identified weakness, sitting uninstalled on a shelf.
[7][8] Shelfware in the form of money spent on licensing more "seats" than needed[9] "cuts into the bottom line.
[11] One consulting company considered it a small percentage, compared to "the $3.6 trillion in worldwide IT spending forecasted" for the following year.
Computerworld cited an industry analyst as saying that "a lot of customers didn't know" and hence regarding CAL "never deploy the software."
[18] A related idea is the software subscription model, which Oracle Corporation CEO Larry Ellison tied to two other marketing concepts: fashions in women's clothing[19] and two computing alternatives to FUD[20]/Vaporware: Grid Computing and SaaS[21][22][23] Following major layoffs during the 2008 drop in the economy, some companies found themselves keeping this double-spending effect: both IT and the department did not have the institutional memory that would justify canceling renewals.