Does Maxon know that Students are the future clients?

When Cinema 4D R13 was released in, I believe it was October, I was realy surprised that there was no possibility for students to get a free copy of the software or at least a much cheaper one as the versions before, so I wrote them a mail and they told me it would just takes up to a month to release a students solution. As you know, it is the end of January now and there is still no students version available. I do really not understand why, but I'll write down a few lines about my thoughts on the Industy and how they work together with students.

When I was going into the colorfull and fancy World of 3D, Motion and Design I chose Cinema 4D to get into 3D, just because I heard that it's easy to use and fast to learn. Of course it really is! But now 3 Years later I'm at university and studying the Audiovisual Media Programm, so a lot of people ask: "oh what software did you use for that? ah ok Cinema 4D, is it free?"

and of course I have to tell them that there was an  expensive old version and that there is not even a cheaper version of the R13 now. So I can just tell them:"Hey you might have a look at students.autodesk.com there you get a 3 Year License to use Maya or 3DsMax or what ever you want for free. You are not allowed to use it commercial, but you can learn with it". So everybody downloads the Autodesk Suite and gets into the 3D World with Autodesk. in 3-5 Years when they hit into the professional Industry, they will buy one of the Autodesk Solutions, because they used it the last 5 years and they don't want to learn new Software. So Autodesk really knows who are the clients of the future. But what's up with Maxon? Do they really do not know it or are they not interested in new clients, new talents or new professionals who help them getting better?

I for myself using both now, the free Maya one for university stuff and the commercial R13 in the Agency I work for. But If I would start again, I would choose Maya...No I would choose the intelligent Solution.

Whats your opinion about the strategy of Maxon vs Autodesk? you agree with me? you totaly disagree? Hit me a line!