[tptacek]

It's expensive, but it probably doesn't cost nearly enough. IDA is the Microsoft Word of software reverse engineering, and its low price relative to the bill rates of people who actually use it is a boat anchor for the entire reversing market. It's difficult to charge more than IDA charges for new products. Since the market for reversing products is always going to involve a relatively small number of people doing very high-value work, it's hard to build a sustainable business in it.

Now that IDA has very serious competition, from Binja and Hopper, it's unlikely that problem is going to resolve itself in the long term.

[lawnchair_larry]

Disagree, most people who use IDA professionally only use it occasionally, when the job calls for it. I know many security professionals who only end up using it a few times a year, but when they need it they need it. Full time reverse engineers are the exception, but they are not the majority of IDA users. For everyone else, it's typically one of many pieces of expensive software.

Though it's unclear if we are discussing sticker shock over IDA Pro or over IDA Pro + Hex Rays decompilers, because there is a pretty huge increase in cost as you start needing those.