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How I saved a company over $100K a year in reporting

Sounds pretty good doesn’t it? This is a story about knowing what you are reporting and the reasoning behind it. Windows 2012 was launched a couple of years ago (give or take). At that time there were several service providers reporting Windows Enterprise. Their customers had applications that needed the functionality of Windows Enterprise, and since it wasn’t virtualized, Windows Datacenter was not an option. The service provider continued to report/license Windows Enterprise after the launch of 2012. There’s nothing wrong with this, in fact, the terms of the SPLA agreement state you can continue licensing 2008 use rights up until your agreement expires. What most providers don’t know is you can do the opposite. You can run 2008 versions but report 2012. Why would they do that?

In this case, they had Windows Enterprise installed; but since Windows Enterprise was discontinued with the release of 2012, they could downgrade to Windows Standard edition. Sounds funny doesn’t it? DOWNGRADE to Windows Standard from Enterprise? Yes, I said that correct. Enterprise is discontinued. Again, nothing was virtual, and that is very important. If it was virtual, they would continue to report Enterprise up until the agreement expired and report Windows Datacenter moving forward. Not only did he save on their monthly usage report, I’m guessing he had added margin since he was already contracted with his customer.

Quick note – not all products discontinued have the same outcome. In most cases (such as SQL 2012 switch to cores) their costs actually went up

Ahh…but where is this written in the SPUR? I’ll save you time, it’s not. That’s why you need to read “Why Timing is Everything” You are bound by the SPUR (i.e.products/versions/use rights) available at the time of signing your SPLA agreement. Those reporting SQL by processor better pay attention.

I receive 100’s of SPLA questions from the SPLA community about licensing and the cost associated with it. From the largest of the large providers down to a guy hosting Windows Web Server out of his parents basement (which is discontinued by the way), there’s always way you can reconsider your strategy. Moral of the story? Pay attention to how you report and don’t report out of convenience…It can cost you.

Thanks for reading,

SPLA Man

2 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on December 30, 2014 in In My Opinion, Windows Virtualization

Tags: Hosting, Microsoft SPLA, spla, SPLA Costs, SPUR, SQL Processors, windows datacenter, Windows Enterprise, windows standard

CRM Price Increases

09 Sep

For those that read my earlier post “Predicting the future” one intuition has already come true. Microsoft announced price increases for Microsoft Dynamics CRM come January, 2015.

All 3 SPLA CRM SKU’s are effected (Basic, Essentials, and Service Provider/PRO edition). For complete breakdown I would suggest reaching out to your SPLA reseller.

So why the increase? Microsoft stated “The CRM price change is intended to more closely align our online and on premises pricing.” So there you have it.

Windows, Core Infrastructure Suite (CIS) and other Dynamics AX, NAV, GP will also see increases. This was previously announced by Microsoft and communicated through the reseller channel.

Thanks

SPLA Man

Hybrid, Dedicated, and Shared Scenarios…

27 Aug

There are three deployment options for service providers – Hybrid (mix of on premise and cloud) Dedicated, and Shared. In this article, we will break each one down to explain how they work and the options available.

Dedicated Scenario – (3 options available)

Option 1
Your customer decides to bring their own software (such as Exchange) and infrastructure (Windows) via their own volume licensing agreement. They do not have software assurance on the software. Can they do this?

Yes. Why? Everything is dedicated. Server, virtual machine all dedicated to one single organization. Software Assurance is NOT required.

Option 2
Your customer decides to bring the software but the hoster will provide the infrastructure in a dedicated environment. Again, customer does not need Software Assurance if it’s a dedicated environment. In this scenario, the hoster (you) will provide the Windows license via SPLA and not report the other applications the customer brings over since it is already covered via their own volume licensing agreement. This is applicable, it’s dedicated (VM and physical servers)

Option 3
Your customer is a healthcare company that needs a dedicated environment due to regulatory compliance. They do not own any software; they would need the hoster to supply the software licenses. Can they (the hoster) do this? Yes, the hoster would report everything under SPLA. The hoster (you) CANNOT use your own volume licensing agreement to provide the solution but you can certainly provide SPLA. Please be aware that if you own a volume licensing agreement, you cannot use the same hardware your volume licensing agreement resides as your hosted solution.

Also keep in mind that SPLA is non perpetual, when the customer leaves, they can no longer use the software they were accessing.

Summary of Dedicated –
Dedicated is applicable for both SPLA and end customer owned volume licensing. Dedicated also means dedicated hardware and dedicated VM’s. In dedicated environments, the end customer DOES NOT need software assurance. From a compliance perspective, it is defined as the following:

“Any hardware running an instance of Microsoft software (OS or application) must be dedicated to a single customer. For example, a SAN device that is not running any Microsoft software may be shared by more than one customer; since, a server or SAN device that runs Microsoft software may only be used by one customer.” (source: Microsoft VDA FAQ)

Hybrid Scenarios – 3 options available

Option 1
You decide to offer your customer a shared infrastructure but they want the same applications to run on premise. A good option would be to have the customer purchase the server applications (think Exchange, SharePoint, Lync) with software assurance (SA) and run them on premise. You (the service provider) would run the same applications in your shared environment BUT report the SAL for SA SKU. Much cheaper option than standard SPLA prices. I wrote about this here This also works well for Disaster Recovery options.

Option 2 (not really a hybrid but just go with it)
You can use license mobility. Microsoft likes to define this as a “hybrid option” but to me, hybrid insinuates the ability to run on premise and in your cloud. License mobility is a SA benefit for certain applications (SQL, CRM, SharePoint, Exchange, Lync) that allows customers to leverage their investment in SA and transfer those licenses into a hosters shared infrastructure. Reason why I don’t think this is truly a hybrid is the customer is TRANSFERRING licenses into your datacenter. This means that if a customer wants to move back to their own datacenter, they have to wait 90 days. (transfer license rule). With SAL for SA, nothing is being transferred. Windows does not have mobility rights, this will need to be reported under your own SPLA. I wrote about license mobility many times – here’s an article for your review – here You can also check out the Microsoft site for more of a definitive definition http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/software-assurance/license-mobility.aspx

Option 3
Good Ole’ SPLA. Customer can run their own servers on premise, you just report SPLA licensing in your shared environment. The new SPLA agreement even allows you to run SPLA software on customer owned hardware as long as you still manage it.

Shared Scenarios – 2 options

Option 1
License Mobility – see above

Option 2
SPLA. We all know what that is.

Summary

I hope this brings a bit more clarity. Sorry if some things are redundant but at the same time, some things are simply worth repeating. Here’s the takeaway – customer’s can always bring licenses into your datacenter. There is no law of the land that prohibits this. What is prohibited is the way you deploy the technology. There is only one option to install customer owned licenses in a shared environment and that is license mobility. Again, (here I go being repetitive) if Microsoft allowed customer owned licenses to be installed in shared environments than why would they create license mobility?

If you still have trouble comprehending all this, shoot me an email located at the top right of this page. One general rule of thumb – if it’s shared – 90% of the time SPLA is required.

Thanks for reading

SPLA Man

15 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on August 27, 2014 in Compliance, License Mobility

Tags: compliance, Hosting, IaaS, License Mobility, Microsoft SPLA, SAL for SA, Software Assurance, spla licensing, Virtualization

It’s a bird…it’s a plane…it’s VDI and SPLA!!!

13 Aug

We have all been there. You see an email come across in the subject line that you’ve seen before. You release a loud sigh, because you already know the response to the email before you even open it. How? Well you’ve been asked the same question before on numerous occcassions and give the same response. For me in particular, the subject in the email is “SPLA and VDI” It’s not frustrating, it’s just I hate saying “no” (just ask my son – a bit spoiled I admit)

I try to write about different topics, but I also like to give updates and understanding to various topics that really hit home; VDI is one of them. You can read my previous article here In this post, I will break VDI into two parts: defining VDI and moving forward.

Definition –

What is a virtual desktop in the licensing world? You should think about virtual desktop as a software assurance benefit. Like license mobility, software assurance is required. Unlike license mobility, there is no option to install in shared infrastructure. Let me repeat – no option to install in shared infrastructure. One more time…no option to install in shared infrastructure. What are the options?

Since VDI/VDA is a software assurance benefit, your customer must purchase their desktop OS with software assurance to have VDI rights. That means if they did not purchase with software assurance, there is no option for them to use virtual desktops from a true licensing perspective. What if the machine is a dummy terminal with no software assurance option available? The end-user would be required to purchase a VDA license for each device. VDA license is kind of like a device CAL, it just provides the user access to a virtual instance. If your customer has not purchased VDA or software assurance on the OS, they need to reconsider if they want a virtual desktop.

Some service providers are under the impression that they can sell a desktop OS perpetually to the customer and host it for them in a dedicated environment. They have the dedicated environment part right, but an OS sold to an end-user does not grant that end-user access to a virtual desktop without software assurance (SA). Secondly, you have to be an authorized reseller to sell perpetual licenses (non SPLA) to consumers. Third, you cannot buy a Windows desktop license yourself and host it to third parties. Anything you buy outside of SPLA is for your internal employees only. Last, not only should you not buy licenses and host, but do not install on servers that is also used for your internal use. That is a big compliance headache. Where is it written that you cannot host on servers internal employees are also accessing? It’s not. That’s what makes it a headache. Just don’t shoot the messenger!

So why can’t the end-user just go to Best Buy or some other retailer, purchase a retail copy, have you (the service provider) host it for them? That not only is a compliance risk, it is also not very economical. Download the FAQ guide here

Moving Forward

What are your options? The good news is Azure, AWS, and all the others have the same rules. They cannot offer desktop OS in the public cloud. This is probably the best FAQ guide I’ve read around Azure and it applies really to all IaaS providers. Check it out here

What you can do is offer Windows Server to emulate a desktop using RDS. I get it, not the same thing but I think it is a more of a compelling solution from a cost perspective (and be compliant). Dedicating a physical server and virtual server is not always the most profitable solution. I’ve said this before, I think the bigger issue is Office. RDS now has mobility rights, I think Office should too.

My Opinion

If I was a service provider, I would work with someone who is an expert in SPLA based licensing and an expert in software assurance benefits. As you can see from my previous posts and with VDI, software assurance is a requirement for most cloud based licensing solutions. In years past, SA (Software Assurance) was only leveraged for organizations that wanted the latest version on software and pay annually for the licenses under their agreement. The “cloud” has changed that. Fast forward to today and customers want to move to the cloud but leverage their existing licenses. Have you been asked that before? How do they accomplish that? The answer is Software Assurance. They need SA to use license mobility, they need SA for VDI, they need SA for hybrid scenarios such as the SAL for SA SKU’s, and they still need SA for latest version rights and pay annually. If I was a Microsoft shareholder, I would applaud that move. It’s a way to add additional revenue on top of the licenses they purchased all the while giving customers the benefits they are after.

So if you ask, “why does Microsoft not allow VDI in a shared environment?” My answer is “why would they?”

Thanks for reading,

SPLA Man

2 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on August 13, 2014 in VDI

Tags: AWS, Azure, Hosted Desktop, Hosting, IaaS, Mobility, RDS, SAL for SA, Software Assurance, spla, VDA, VDI

Help me SAM!

11 Aug

I was on a call the other day and the customer was pleasantly surprised to learn about the SPLA program. Although I do not manage the program in its entirety like the old days, I will say this was a refreshing surprise. When you mention SPLA to a customer, account manager, or even Microsoft, more times than not you here a groan. ABS – Anything But SPLA! I am sure if there are resellers reading this, they would probably agree. Why no love for a program that is growing exponentially year/year? What are better alternatives…buy the licenses outright?

I don’t think the issue is with the program itself; after all, the ability to get started with zero upfront costs from a licensing perspective is pretty cool! I don’t even think the licensing is all that difficult once you get started. The pain point is understanding all the “gotcha’s” and the “in’s” as well as all the “outs” to make sure what you are doing is both compliant and cost-effective. SPLA is an honor based system, but if you are found dishonest, it will cost you.

One of the biggest hurdles is tracking licenses. With the release of Azure, license mobility, and regular SPLA licenses, the ability to track licenses is becoming more complex. End customers do not want to double pay for licenses already purchased and service providers don’t want to report SPLA if they don’t have to. So what do you do?

That’s where my old friend named Sammy comes in. On premise customers have used SAM (Software Asset Management) for years as a mechanism to track licenses purchased and/or deployed. This is not a one time snapshot, (although I guess it could be if you want it to be) but an ongoing strategy to make sure licenses are being consumed properly. If they are not, at least they catch the problem before they get audited.

Service providers are different; very few have a SAM strategy. Most service providers are taking part in license mobility and customer owned licenses more regularly. If you don’t believe me check out all the license mobility partners on Microsoft’s website. If you thought SPLA is complex, try combining on premise licensing and SPLA and see what you have!

What does SAM really do? It’s a strategy. It will give you tools and a team of experts to help guide you through the ever-changing license use rights (SPUR or PUR for those playing at home). In most cases, it provides you with the necessary resources to help protect you from vendor audits. There are different levels of SAM to cater towards different types of environments. Just like service providers, no two environments are the same.

Here’s my advice (if you are wondering) – if you are a service provider, get a SAM strategy in place. There’s a saying I read somewhere ( I believe LinkedIn) that said if you think audit prevention is expensive, try being audited. (paraphrased here but you get my point).

If you don’t have a SAM resource, email me, (blaforge@splalicensing.com) I can be your SPLA/SAM resource. I guarantee I know the program better than most. You can also check out our SAM services at SoftwareONE here

As always, hope you find this helpful and gives you some ideas.

Thanks for reading,

SPLA Man

Links to vendor websites and other blogs

17 Jan

Here’s a list of resources I think are worth checking out. Not all pertain to SPLA specifically, but in the world of IT – all licensing programs find a way to relate to one another. Check it out.

Microsoft SPLA Program
http://www.microsoft.com/hosting

Microsoft Marketing Campaigns
http://www.readytogomicrosoft.com

Great Microsoft Volume Licensing Blog
http://www.microsoftlicensereview.com/

TechNet
http://blogs.technet.com/b/volume-licensing/

SPLA Reseller (I work for them with SAM) There is a free compliance check where the team will review your order and ensure you are licensing correctly and the most cost effective way. http://www.softwareone.com/en-us/Licensing/Microsoft-SPLA/Pages/default.aspx

SPLA Reseller Email – SPLA.us@softwareone.com

VMware Service Provider Program
http://www.vmware.com/partners/service-provider.html

Citrix CSP Program
http://www.citrix.com/partner-programs/service-provider.html

Citrix Marketing Tools
http://www.citrix.com/csptoolkit.com

Citrix/Microsoft DaaS Whitepapers, etc.
http://www.Citrix.com/Microsoft

Hope this helps

SPLA Man

1 Comment

Posted by MS Licensing on January 17, 2014 in Compliance, In My Opinion

Tags: Blogs, Citrix, Citrix CSP, Hosting, licensing, marketing, resources, spla, Technet, VMWare

What’s Your Licensing Strategy?

14 Jun

I love the question “What’s your cloud strategy?” It’s the new ice breaker for salespeople around the globe. My thoughts? Why bother asking customers about their cloud strategy if it does not include licensing? The BIGGEST mistake service providers (SPLA’s) make is selling a solution first and worrying about the licensing impact later. They build data centers, talk about virtualizing, even talk about the savings of cap ex vs. op ex, but never talk about the licensing until someone brings it up or they get audited. Just because the technology enables something, does not mean you can license that way.

VDI is a prime example of this. “You can host virtual desktops as a service right? Install the desktop OS on a server and stream it? Why not? The concept has been around for years. I ‘Googled’ VDI as a service and several companies are doing this…it must be right…right?” Wrong! Yes, technically speaking you can host virtual desktops using Windows 7/8. Licensing gurus and the product user rights and the audit team will disagree with you. Unfortunately there’s no way to do this under SPLA. Next question that comes up is “why?” Wish I knew the answer, perhaps Microsoft is looking out after the OEM manufactures, but then again they launched Surface.

Microsoft is auditing everyone. There are few guarantees in life, but one guarantee is not everyone under the SPLA program is licensing correctly. Just a word of advice, know the licensing before implementing a solution.

Thanks for reading,

SPLA Man

2 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on June 14, 2013 in Compliance, License Mobility, SPLA General

Tags: audit, compliance, Hosting, License Mobility, spla licensing, SPUR

Why I Love License Mobility (Farm Edition)

15 May

Life is full of little surprises, license mobility within server farms happens to be one of them. License mobility within server farms allows a service provider to take advantage of virtualization without the worry of over licensing or for that matter; under licensing.

Let’s say you have a host machine and that has (2) 6 core procs running 10 virtual machines. You want to run SQL Enterprise. You also have a second host, within the same server farm. The VMs on one machine can migrate to the other. You have to license both hosts right? Wrong! Here’s why.

The old licensing methodology would require you to license both hosts. The new methodology, would allow you to license 1. In the above example, you would need to license 12 cores of SQL Enterprise. You have to license the host with the most cores, but at least it is just the one host! What’ the caveat? You cannot have both hosts running VMs at the same time. If you do, you must license both hosts. Check out the SPUR. Not all products allow license mobility so be sure to check!

The definition of a server farm is as follows:

Assigning Licenses and Using Software within a Server Farm

You may determine the number of licenses you need, assign those licenses, and use the server software as provided in the General License Terms. Alternatively, you may apply the use rights below.

Server Farm. A server farm consists of up to two data centers each physically located:

in a time zone that is within four hours of the local time zone of the other (Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and not DST), and/or
within the European Union (EU) and/or European Free Trade Association (EFTA).

Each data center may be part of only one server farm. You may reassign a data center from one server farm to another, but not on a short-term basis (i.e., not within 30 days of the last assignment).

Please check out the products in the SPUR to ensure the mobility rights apply. Keep in mind, not all products are eligible. For example, SQL Web does not have mobility rights, but SQL Enterprise does. Be Careful!

In my opinion, this is a great way to take advantage of virtualization, reduce licensing costs, but more importantly…be compliant. If an auditor were to come knocking on the door to your datacenter, there’s not much they can say if you take advantage of unlimited virtualization rights such as Windows Datacenter and SQL Enterprise 2012.

Thanks for reading,

SPLA Man

2 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on May 15, 2013 in License Mobility

Tags: Hosting, License Mobility, Server Farms, spla, spla licensing, SQL 2012

How to License Exchange

04 May

Article update: We created a new website called MSCloudlicensing to help SPLA and CSP partners understand the different program options and use rights available to them. The site is designed to be a collaborative platform, which includes a forum to ask and answer licensing questions, document library, and licensing articles. It’s more in depth than a simple blog. Check it out, it’s free! www.mscloudlicensing.com

Document Library: Easy to read whitepapers on licensing and best practices. What really happens in an audit? How are other service providers handling CSP and Azure? AWS licensing? https://mscloudlicensing.com/document-library/

Forum: Experts always review and answer your licensing questions. https://mscloudlicensing.com/forum/

Articles: Most of the splalicensing.com articles you are used to reading and many more on CSP, Azure, AWS, and other cloud providers.
https://mscloudlicensing.com/subscription/

In my years of managing the SPLA program, I came to the conclusion that no one likes to babysit an Exchange server. Organizations do not have the resources or the time to constantly monitor a server, and hosters (if that’s a word) feel the pressure of managing a mission critical application such as email. If it goes down, not only can you lose a customer, but the customer might lose business as well!

For those hosters that feel up to the challenge, Exchange can be a very profitable opportunity. Whenever there is complexity, along comes value…which every hoster needs to run a business. What’s the downside? As always, there’s a concern over licensing.

Exchange for SPLA partners (hosters) comes in five flavors: Exchange Basic, Standard, Standard Plus, Enterprise, and Enterprise Plus. Each comes with different functionality as well as price. From experience, 90% of what is being reported is the Exchange Standard SKU. The breakdown of each SKU is as follows:

Exchange Basic – Think of OWA/POP Mail only
Exchange Standard – Features of Exchange Basic as well as shared calendaring and mobile device synchronization
Exchange Standard Plus – Features of Exchange Standard plus the full Outlook client
Exchange Enterprise – Includes all the features of Exchange Standard as well as unified messaging and anti virus/spam features
Exchange Enterprise Plus – All the features listed above plus the full Outlook client

The list above is just an overview, for a full feature list check out the SPUR (user section). The way you license Exchange is by user. Every user that HAS access to the software will need a license; not who does access. Think of your cable company, they will charge you regardless if you turn your TV on or not. User licenses works the same way.

In my opinion, the key to a successful Exchange launch is to offer a multi-tenant (shared) environment. If you license Windows by processor (Exchange runs on a Windows OS) and Exchange by user, the more users you have on that particular server the less expensive it is for the user. Eventually all you are charging is the cost of the Exchange license. That’s how large service providers are able to seemingly charge less. They have thousands of users accessing a limited number of servers in a shared environment.

If a customer wants a dedicated environment (one server hosting one client) the end customer can bring their licenses to you and you host it for them, or provide the licenses via SPLA, but the cost per user is going to be higher (unless it’s a large enterprise).

Once you offer Exchange, it makes it easier to offer other collaboration applications as well; such as SharePoint, CRM, and Lync. Who knows, you might become the next Amazon or Rackspace.

Thanks for reading!

SPLA Man

14 Comments

Posted by MS Licensing on May 4, 2013 in Exchange

Tags: Exchange, Hosting, licensing, spla, SPUR, technology

SPLA Licensing

Tag Archives: Hosting

How I saved a company over $100K a year in reporting

Hybrid, Dedicated, and Shared Scenarios…

It’s a bird…it’s a plane…it’s VDI and SPLA!!!

Help me SAM!

More SQL 2012 Questions…..ANSWERED

Links to vendor websites and other blogs

What’s Your Licensing Strategy?

Why I Love License Mobility (Farm Edition)

How to License Exchange

Licensing Help?

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