Messagelabs - Disturbing Contract Pattern Emerging ?

Over the last few weeks and months we've been talking to Messagelabs cutomers about moving over to Postini/Google. This is nothing new. All customers are looking to save money at the moment regardless of their size. What is interesting though, is that we have seen now instances of four different customers, (all different sizes) who have bought both direct from Messagelabs (ML) and partners. When customers have tried to give notice to ML, they have found this difficult, (impossible) to leave them. ML have a very tight contract in place which stipulates 90 days notice..which is fine...except if you miss their window of 'notice', and don't put it in writing, to th right person/department on the right dates, then you find yourself automatically renewed for another year and there's nothing the customer can do about it. Just continue to wait another year. Now I wouldn't mind if this was out in the open, but how many ML customers ever read the contract they signed, or can even find it now ! Postini has massively undercut this market in the last 2 years, and Google buying them only seeks to re-inforce their credibility as the biggest player in the world...heck even Symantec had to buy number 2 vendor for a change ! Just look at the effect Google Apps has had on Microsoft ! Customers know they have a choice and the market is competitive. We know that any of the Postini competitors can't get even close on features and price. Mimecast, Websense, ML, none of them get close on price to Postini. Oh, and Postini have a nice and simple 14 day notice period once you have been with them for a year. Why can't Messagelabs do this ? What are they frightened of ? Maybe Symantec will bring some sense to this worrying situation before their investment in ML is eroded by Postini ?