I woke up this morning to a great Twitter from a good friend and great coach Jak Plihal (http://www.beingsolutions.com/). It was the quote:
"It is hard to get a man to understand something, if his living depends on him not understanding it." by Upton Sinclair.
To me, this perfectly explains the relationship between resellers (VARs, LARs, and any other acronym that is responsible for selling you software), software publishers and the details of software licensing.
There are details in software licensing agreements and product use rights that can be turned to a benefit for a company in legally reducing their software licensing costs...but you're not going to find them all out by asking your reseller or publisher for help.
Why? Not because they are necessarily trying to mislead you or keep you in ignorance - instead it's because they honestly don't even think of those options...because their living (or magnitude of it) depends on them not thinking of those options.
Now, there are definitely some that are better than others (I love working with Softmart for example as their reps have demonstrated to me a strong ability to keep the customer's needs in focus) but as long as their income relies upon what you buy then Upton Sinclair's quote will continue to apply.
When it comes to negotiating the best deal for licensing - the bulk of the savings opportunities comes from making full use of the product use rights and volume licensing agreements terms - not from the discount you negotiate (or not from the discount you negotiate without knowing these items intimately). Get your advice and education from an independent expert...know in advance who profits from your purchase and what their motivation is so you can better analyze their advice.
Remember, "It is hard to get a man to understand something, if his living depends on him not understanding it." Upton Sinclair.
Thanks Jak!
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
The Timebomb - IT Backoffice Applications
We seem to spend so much time focusing on desktop licensing and trying to get that right...but frequently it is our IT backoffice applications that get us into trouble.
Despite change control on our desktops and servers, it seems that we continue to find an abnormally high number of IT management tools that are underlicensed. This is also an area where we find a lot of functionality redundancy.
IT will police the end users, but typically no one is policing IT's software. Here are some common costly issues we see at new customers:
Symantec NetBackup - it may be part of standard operations to automatically cover new servers by the technology but where is the automatic purchasing of the necessary additional licenses? Also we frequently see resellers selling the Express program licenses, even when the customer is already a Rewards program customer - make sure you're getting the benefits of your overall Symantec spend on each purchase.
Development/Test/Disaster Recovery - typically all of these instances require licensing. Make sure your servers are licensed appropriately, don't assume you can build a Test server and not license it!
Imaging/Virus scan/Desktop management - yes these are all standards of doing business but frequently they don't get reviewed to ensure that sufficient licenses exist to cover usage.
Client Access Licenses - if you're running Microsoft Windows server, each user or device requires a CAL. If you then add Sharepoint on that server, you also then need a CAL for that. If you're running SQL server to support Sharepoint, you need a CAL or a processor license for SQL. The list goes on and on...if you're using the resources of the server chances are there is a corresponding license requirement. This typically falls to IT to manage.
In short, make sure you're looking at licensing requirements on your IT management apps as well as your end-user apps.
As always, if you need help - let us know!
Despite change control on our desktops and servers, it seems that we continue to find an abnormally high number of IT management tools that are underlicensed. This is also an area where we find a lot of functionality redundancy.
IT will police the end users, but typically no one is policing IT's software. Here are some common costly issues we see at new customers:
Symantec NetBackup - it may be part of standard operations to automatically cover new servers by the technology but where is the automatic purchasing of the necessary additional licenses? Also we frequently see resellers selling the Express program licenses, even when the customer is already a Rewards program customer - make sure you're getting the benefits of your overall Symantec spend on each purchase.
Development/Test/Disaster Recovery - typically all of these instances require licensing. Make sure your servers are licensed appropriately, don't assume you can build a Test server and not license it!
Imaging/Virus scan/Desktop management - yes these are all standards of doing business but frequently they don't get reviewed to ensure that sufficient licenses exist to cover usage.
Client Access Licenses - if you're running Microsoft Windows server, each user or device requires a CAL. If you then add Sharepoint on that server, you also then need a CAL for that. If you're running SQL server to support Sharepoint, you need a CAL or a processor license for SQL. The list goes on and on...if you're using the resources of the server chances are there is a corresponding license requirement. This typically falls to IT to manage.
In short, make sure you're looking at licensing requirements on your IT management apps as well as your end-user apps.
As always, if you need help - let us know!
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Software Licensing - 2010
Wow, can't say I'm upset to see the end of 2009! Having been in business since 1999 I've seen some ups and downs (think California, technology, early 2000's...ouch!) and am happy that with business maturity comes a certain tolerance to economy and business shifts...but I'm ready for this year to be over!
What's in store for licensing in 2010? I think we will continue to see a lot of acquisitions occur this year - which means eventual changes to volume licensing agreements. Be sure to keep an eye on mergers, acquisitions and divestitures to see which of your software licenses are impacted. It typically takes at least a year for any changes to volume licensing agreements but it might have a big impact on your maintenance decisions.
For Microsoft users there will be several new releases this year in Office, SharePoint and SQL Server to name a few. SQL Server is also being purported to have a couple of new editions and changes to some of the licensing terms (in particular SQL Enterprise and SQL Datacenter edition). Be sure to keep a close eye on these, especially if you have a virtualized model.
SaaS will continue to feel it's way and don't be surprised to hear more about the Microsoft Enterprise Subscription agreement...an agreement that has long existed but (in my opinion...as is all of this blog) wasn't priced well for most businesses.
Also, for those renewing Microsoft agreements there are some changes to your terms and conditions that you might not be aware of...the loss of the 30 day "grace" period on renewing of Software Assurance and an increase to 90 days for notice of change of reseller (hint, this determines who gets paid for your purchases and impacts any incentives resellers will offer to you - be sure to handle this on a timely basis if changing. You don't want the reseller you're "firing" to get paid for the renewal you do next month.)
What do you expect to see happen with software in 2010? Any licensing trends you know are happening or changes to PURs?
What's in store for licensing in 2010? I think we will continue to see a lot of acquisitions occur this year - which means eventual changes to volume licensing agreements. Be sure to keep an eye on mergers, acquisitions and divestitures to see which of your software licenses are impacted. It typically takes at least a year for any changes to volume licensing agreements but it might have a big impact on your maintenance decisions.
For Microsoft users there will be several new releases this year in Office, SharePoint and SQL Server to name a few. SQL Server is also being purported to have a couple of new editions and changes to some of the licensing terms (in particular SQL Enterprise and SQL Datacenter edition). Be sure to keep a close eye on these, especially if you have a virtualized model.
SaaS will continue to feel it's way and don't be surprised to hear more about the Microsoft Enterprise Subscription agreement...an agreement that has long existed but (in my opinion...as is all of this blog) wasn't priced well for most businesses.
Also, for those renewing Microsoft agreements there are some changes to your terms and conditions that you might not be aware of...the loss of the 30 day "grace" period on renewing of Software Assurance and an increase to 90 days for notice of change of reseller (hint, this determines who gets paid for your purchases and impacts any incentives resellers will offer to you - be sure to handle this on a timely basis if changing. You don't want the reseller you're "firing" to get paid for the renewal you do next month.)
What do you expect to see happen with software in 2010? Any licensing trends you know are happening or changes to PURs?
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