One of the issues with SPLA is that the program is very reactionary. You report in the arrears, you bill clients based on what they used previously, and no one cares about compliance until you receive an audit notification. It’s time to be proactive in this reactionary world.
With over 20 years of experience working with cloud providers in various capacities, one thing they all have in common is the challenges of licensing. For many organizations, they license the same thing month after month, without any data or understanding of why, solely for convenience. When you are audited, there is a typical 3-year lookback period. If you do not understand the licensing requirements, you will be charged a penalty for licenses not reported during that period. That tells me two things: 1) You are out of compliance and will owe a significant unbudgeted expense. 2) You are not charging your customers correctly, either.
For a moment, set aside the compliance risk and consider how long it takes your sales organization to close a deal. Most sales cycles are typically 3-6 months. You spent all that time, resources, and education to land that customer. Fast-forward 3 years, and all along, you have been charging them incorrectly. You are then faced with either telling the customer they owe for those licenses (which is unlikely, as the customer will likely just leave) or you are forced to absorb the costs. That’s why it’s crucial to be proactive before audit time. In addition, this is your opportunity to eliminate risk before it becomes a risk.
How do you become proactive? It’s important to understand what you have installed now. You can do this by running scripts. If you were audited in the past, most auditors provide this script; if not, I have one used for audit purposes that I can send to you. The tool/script is only one side of the story, though. You have to understand how to connect what is installed to the licensing rules. We perform this analysis by creating an Effective License Position (ELP) report. It will show what you should be reporting now and potentially what you would owe if audited based on your SPLA usage report. We can correct the mistakes now and provide education to your customers about their options if for whatever reason what they are doing does not meet the licensing rules (as an example, no software assurance).
What you need is not a tool, what you need is a SAM program to help you create processes and policies now rather than later. Think about this, if you are reporting 100k a month or 5k a month, don’t you want to ensure it is right?
Have a question about this or other topics or would like to review more, please email info@splalicensing.com Together, we can navigate the treacherous waters called Microsoft licensing.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft Licensing, SAM for SPLA, SPLA Audit, SPLA Compliance, SPLA Tool
In certain markets, Ukraine, Turkey, Iraq, Brazil, India, Poland, and a handful of others SPLA is paused. What does “pause” mean and what impact does this have if I am a hoster in the US or UK?
Well, kind of like an audit. take a breath. SPLA is not dead. In fact, globally, SPLA continues to grow. This pause is for net new hosters who want to sign up in the program. If you are an existing hoster, there’s no impact. You can continue to use SPLA and even renew SPLA with updated terms. I think the bigger question is SPLA moving forward, and what changes do I see happening. To answer that question, let me share an example.
This morning I had the pleasure of speaking to a large hoster in Europe. We discussed SPLA and his thoughts on CSP. He’s an infrastructure provider, mainly hosting Windows, RDS, and a little SQL. Most customers bring licenses into their datacenter. He’s not interested in using Azure or AWS, he wants to host out of his datacenter, and uses it to differentiate amongst the larger providers. End customers bring licenses into their datacenter and they host it.
Wow SPLA Man, that’s a turn pager of a story. Tell me more!! Sure. I think this hoster is what SPLA is about. No one is a SaaS provider using SPLA. Hosters don’t provide Office as a service through the SPLA program. They provide Windows Server (it’s cheap) and they provide SQL (it’s expensive). What he likes about SPLA is the flexibility. He controls the customer end-to-end. Unlike CSP hoster, Microsoft does not know who the end customer is in SPLA. That’s where I see SPLA changing. In fact, with this latest announcement, they state “change is the first in a series of changes evolving the SPLA program. Future changes, including new SPLA agreement templates and a new process of reporting and submitting END CUSTOMER USER DATA for compliance verification are also planned”
End customer data has and always will be the problem with SPLA for Microsoft. They want to control the end customer and know why and how they are purchasing their software. Other than that, SPLA is a huge benefit to Microsoft. Differentiates Microsoft from AWS and the like.
If you are an infrastructure provider (like in the story above) what should you do now? I will keep saying it, start with education. Arm yourself with the best licensing practice around. This licensing environment in which we live is changing rapidly. Second, I would communicate these changes to your customer and how they may impact the way they purchase Microsoft products. All the changes that happened over the last few years, has zero impact to SPLA. It is all about the end customer. Last, I would start developing a SAM practice internally. You need to clean up your own mess before you do anything else. You should look into using OctopusCloud
More to come on this. I am also doing an interview with AWS and Microsoft. Stay tuned for more.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Azure, CSP, CSPhoster, CSPHosting, Datacenter, Flexiblevirtualization, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft SPLA, OctopusCloud, spla, spla licensing, SPLAagreement, SPLApause
Ahhh…..Microsoft. If you haven’t heard the news, there is an update coming
for SPLA regarding pricing and new announcements to the program.
Some of these changes include Windows Server, CIS, and the Office Suite. Suppose
you want an opportunity to review these changes and how it directly affects
your business. In that case, we can certainly set up a time to review and how
other service providers are handling this impact. You can reach us at
info@splalicensing.com
Why the changes, and what precisely are they? The change has a lot to do
with the direction Microsoft is going with its programs. SPLA is a mature
program, with other solutions such as CSP, an emerging program for
Microsoft.
That doesn’t mean SPLA is
going away, but it does mean there will be changes, updates, and pricing
increases.
If you would like to learn more, we can assist.
Do not keep licensing the same each month,
expecting different results.
If you are
frustrated and want an opportunity to optimize and, in some cases, reduce your
costs, let SPLA Man come to the rescue! Let’s set up some time and review what
these updates mean for you!
Please email
us at
info@splalicensing.com
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: CSP, Hosting, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft SPLA, Microsoft SPLA Audit Support, spla, spla licensing, SPLA Price Increase
Will Azure be part of the SPLA program?
I wouldn’t think so and wouldn’t know how they could incorporate the two. Azure is Microsoft hosted and SPLA is partnered. Microsoft will want to keep SPLA and Azure separate.
Is Azure Stack part of SPLA?
Azure Stack by itself is not part of SPLA. What’s part of SPLA is the Windows licenses. As a service provider, you could deploy Azure Stack, pay the base consumption rate, and use Windows licensing with SPLA. In fact, I think it’s less expensive to do it this way.
If my customer wants to use their own Windows license on Azure Stack, do they also require CAL’s?
Yes. You need to pay attention to the Product Terms to ensure compliance. As an example, volume licensing prohibits hosting. You cannot install your own Windows licenses through volume licensing and host using Azure Stack.
Does Office 365 qualify for the SAL for SA product in SPLA?
The only Office 365 product that is eligible for SAL for SA is Skype.
Is SPLA pricing going up?
Yes and will not be decreasing anytime soon.
Since AWS offers dedicated hardware, could I transfer my customer’s license to their datacenter without Software Assurance?
Yes. If its dedicated hardware Software Assurance is not required.
What about Azure?
No, you would need Software Assurance.
Will Microsoft finally allow MSDN to be licensed in my datacenter?
Probably not. Although if you use Azure, MSDN is eligible to be transferred.
If I sell CSP through 2-Tier distributor, can I sign the QMTH addendum?
No. You must be CSP 1 – Tier to qualify for QMTH.
Can I outsource support for certain software through CSP?
Yes. You an resell the solutions you can support and leverage another partner for support for other products.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Amazon Cloud, Amazon Web Services, AWS, Azure, Azure stack, Cloud licensing, Cloud Solution Provider Program, CSP, CSP Licensing, Dedicated hosting, Hosting, Microsoft Cloud, MSDN, Office 365, QMTH, QMTH addendum, SAL for SA, Service Provider License Agreement, Software Assurance, spla, SPLA Audit
Here is a list of some of the questions we received this month. Enjoy!
Why does Microsoft not allow a SPLA SQL VM to be installed in a public cloud? I understand if you were licensing the physical layer, but if you want to install on a VM, you can easily allocate the number of cores and report accordingly. Any ideas?
No. Honestly there is no reason outside of it’s just prohibited. You cannot license SPLA cores/processors in public clouds even if the VM is dedicated.
What can be installed in Azure through SPLA licensing?
Anything that is licensed by SAL can be moved to Azure. For your end customers, anything that has Software Assurance and is license mobility eligible can be transferred including: Windows 10 E3 (QMTH), Office 365 Pro Plus (QMTH) and MSDN. Your end customers can also leverage Azure HUB to get discounted pricing for the Windows Servers they purchased with SA. Check out the Azure FAQ site https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/licensing-faq/
Is Microsoft going to discontinue SPLA?
Nah. I bet it will be merged into a new program though. Just a hunch.
I received a compliance notification the other day. Am I in trouble?
Depends on the type of notification and if you are out of compliant :). If you have questions, we can review it with you. Just email info@splalicensing.com
Can I report Windows 2016 but run Windows 2012?
Yes. No problem there. What you cannot do is license Windows 2012 and run 2016. Don’t do that.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: CSP Licensing, Microsoft Azure Licensing, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft SPLA Audit Support, Microsoft SQL Server, QMTH addendum, SAL, Software Asset Management, SPLA Audit, SPLA Discontinued, Subscriber Access License, Windows 2016, Windows Azure
Here are a few hot topics this week around CSP. Enjoy!
What would happen if I sell myself Office Pro Plus through my own CSP authorization? Can I do that?
No. You cannot sell yourself Office 365 Pro Plus licenses. You can purchase it through any volume licensing program or through another CSP provider. Might be a good way to check out the competition support processes though!
If you are CSP authorized in Australia, but have customers in UK, can you resell Office 365 through CSP?
No. You can only resell in the region in which you are authorized.
If my end customer purchased Office 365 Pro Plus through Volume Licensing, can I host it from my datacenter if I am QMTH authorized?
Yes. The end customer can purchase from any licensing program as long as it is Office 365 Pro Plus version. As the service provider, you must be QMTH authorized.
If I purchase CSP licenses indirectly from my distributor, do I qualify for QMTH?
No. You must CSP Direct authorized in order to that. You cannot purchase from a distributor and offer VDI or Office Pro Plus.
If I sell Azure through CSP, how do I know which region my data is located?
With Azure, you get to pick the region.
If I sell Office 365 through CSP, which region is my service hosted from?
The address on the invoice determines the location of the services.
***Watch out for the new Microsoft Cloud Agreement (MCA) coming in September. You can download the old version here
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Azure, Azure stack, Cloud Solution Provider Program, CSP, CSP Direct, CSP Tier 1, CSP Tier 2, Microsoft Cloud, Office 365, QMH, QMTH, SCA, shared computer activation, spla, VDI
What happens if you have end customers who want to use Office Online for external users (non-employees of your organization). Is that SPLA? In this article, we will break down Office Online through three programs – SPLA, Volume Licensing, and CSP.
SPLA
If you are hosting Office for another organization SPLA definitely fits. As an example, if you provide DaaS to your customers who are also licensed for Office, they can access Office Online. In this model, you license SharePoint (requirement for Office Online) Office by user, RDS per user, and Windows + SQL Server. Very expensive to simply offer a customer the ability to view and edit documents online.
Volume Licensing and Office 365
Office Online was added as a Software Assurance benefit for Office in 2016. End customer’s who simply want to view documents can download it directly from the Volume Licensing Services Center (VLSC). End customers that require document creation, edit/save functionality will be required to have an on-premises Office license with Software Assurance or an Office 365 ProPlus subscription. Any customer that purchased an Office 2016 suite through Volume Licensing before August 1, 2016 will not require SA through August 1, 2019. After August 1, 2019 they must buy SA for any on-premise Office licenses.
According to the Product Terms (May 2016) “If Customer has a License for Office 365 Pro Plus, then Customer may use Office Online services. Each of Customer’s Licensed Users of Office 365 Pro Plus may access Office Online services for viewing and editing documents, as long as they are also licensed for SharePoint Online or OneDrive for Business.” It’s the last sentence that stings. In other words, you want Office Online? Better buy Office 365 E3.
Office Online for CSP
The same rules apply. In this scenario, the hosting company could sell Office 365 E3 through CSP program to their end users. In CSP, the end customer is paying month – month and paying for support.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Azure, Cloud Solution Provider Program, CSP, DaaS, desktop as a service, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft Licensing, Microsoft SPLA, Office 365, Office Online, spla
You have questions…We have answers. Another month, and another list of licensing questions asked by the hosting community.
- I have a small hosting company that runs primarily Linux machines with a few Windows VM’s mixed in. The only thing we do customer facing with Windows systems is a small number of users access our application via a published app over RDP Web. Do I need SPLA?
Yes. You have Windows running in your cloud environment. It does not matter how small or large the environment is. One thing you might want to check out is the Cloud Platform Suite. You must run Hyper-V and System Center but it could lower your costs.
- I get CSP from one reseller and SPLA from another. Do I qualify for the new QMTH addendum or do I need to get it all from one source? Totally confused.
In QMTH, you are the CSP partner, not someone else. I am guessing you are using the CSP reseller to go indirect. If that is the case, you must become CSP Direct authorized. Purchasing CSP from a third-party does not qualify you for QMH. That being said, your customer can purchase CSP from any organization and you can host it for them (if you are QMH authorized).
- The audit bug got me. I think it’s because my reseller refuses to submit my usage report even though I sent it to them several times. Any advice?
Microsoft can audit any partner they choose. There’s not one factor that triggers an audit. More eyes will be watching if you are continually delinquent on your monthly report. The biggest reason why a reseller does not submit a usage report is because the provider is delinquent on their payments. Are you up to date? All payments paid to the reseller?
- Can I rent a PC using the QMTH addendum? I know in the past I could rent a Windows desktop license in SPLA. Can I do it now?
I think it makes sense to do so but unfortunately it is not part of the addendum. I would love feedback here. Section C of the QMTH addendum states” “This Amendment does not authorize Customer to resell, distribute, or otherwise provide End User or CSP Licensees direct access to Windows 10 Software” In order to lease a PC to a third-party you need to follow the Microsoft Leasing Agreement.
- I report Office, Exchange, SharePoint and Skype. I heard rumors of a price increase coming in the pipeline from various resellers that I reached out to. Any truth?
Let me put it to you this way – The products you just mentioned happen to be part of Office 365. I don’t foresee Microsoft lowering pricing in SPLA for the same products offered by Microsoft.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
PS – What was the SPLA partner’s response to my answer for question 5? “That’s BS Mate!” My response? “Don’t shoot the messenger.” Have a question? Email info@splalicensing.com
Tags: Cloud, Cloud Solution Provider Program, CSP, CSP Direct, CSP Indirect, Exchange Online, Hosting, Lease Agreement, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft Compliance, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Server Licensing, Microsoft SPLA Pricing, QMH, Qualified Multitenant Hosting, SharePoint Online, SPLA Audit, spla licensing, SPLA Reporting, SPLA Reseller
There’s been a lot of talk as of late about the new QMTH addendum. I’ve written a couple of articles on the topic here In this article, we will summarize what is written in the addendum so there’s no surprises. I listed some (not all) of terms and conditions to ensure you are up to speed on the latest developments.
- CSP Membership – You (or affiliates) must be a Direct CSP partner. This means you cannot leverage an Indirect CSP partner for this program. In other words, if you receive CSP licensing from Ingram Micro or SherWeb (as an example) your partnership with those distributors/partner does not qualify for QMTH. Your organization must be CSP Direct authorized, not your partner.
- Must meet the system requirements – System Requirements can be found here
- Have an active SPLA agreement.
- Reporting Requirements – You will always need to report underlying licenses in SPLA. Those underlying licenses could be any software to deploy a VDI solution – (Windows Server and RDS). In addition, you must report (by the last calendar day of each month) the Windows 10/O365 licenses deployed. This is manual, meaning you will send an email to the QMTH alias for submission. Once automated reporting is available, you must enable Microsoft’s automated reporting tool. Microsoft will use the tool to collect your customer’s organization ID and tenant ID as well as the total number of users accessing the software.
- As the provider, you must report to your SPLA Reseller the program administrative fee. If you are currently in the SCA program, you will be familiar with this SKU.
- As the provider, you must make all education materials publicly available. You cannot just sign up for CSP, the education material should be like what’s on the QMH website.
- For each per user subscription to Windows 10 Enterprise, the end-user can only access up to four (4) instances of Windows 10 either on Azure or you, the QMTH hoster. This is like the SCA program in which the end user has five (5) instances of Office Pro Plus, Windows 10 works the same way.
Listed above is a summary. I encourage you to reach out to your Microsoft rep for additional information. I am happy to review it further, it’s a new program with pluses and minuses. Be sure to understand the minuses first 🙂
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: audit, AWS, Azure, Cloud Solution Provider Program, CSP, Hosting, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft SPLA, Office 365, QMH, QMTH addendum, Qualified Multi-tenant addendum, SCA, Windows 10
The year 2017 has brought on A LOT of change for the hosting community. A hosting company used to be an organization that hosted Exchange – fast forward to today and a service provider takes on a whole new meaning. In this article, we will take a look at defining a service provider and how it applies to licensing. Let’s play a little game called “Do they qualify” Have a question? Email info@splalicensing.com
An organization that provides or extends litigation software (that they leased from the publisher) to law firms and other legal entities who are not wholly owned by the organization providing the solution. Does this organization qualify for SPLA?
Yes. If you are an avid reader of splalciensing.com, you probably read my article on EMR Software The same holds true for any software (not just EMR) that runs on Microsoft technology that you do not own, but lease from a third-party. Remember “AS” If you are providing software AS a service that’s hosted from your datacenter environment, SPLA must be part of the equation. Why does this solution qualify for SPLA?
#1 they don’t own the software they are hosting
#2 they do not own the organization(s) who are consuming (using) the software for their benefit.
An organization who sells a product on a website to external users – do they qualify for SPLA?
No. Although they are selling something to consumers via the internet, the software used to deploy the solution benefits the e-commerce company, not the end-user. Where SPLA does fit is if the web company decides to host a website on behalf of another organization. The web company would fall under the SPLA rules. Who benefits from the access is a key question to ask yourself. Second question – is the access used to run their business or my own?
An organization who provides SharePoint to end users to share information. Do they qualify?
No. Simply sharing information does not qualify. If the organization was hosting SharePoint on behalf of another organization, that’s SPLA.
A company hosts Exchange on behalf of another organization but does not charge for this access. Does this qualify for SPLA?
Yes. Microsoft doesn’t care how much money you make from the solution. The question remains – are you providing this “as a service” for a third-party?
A company decides to use AWS as their datacenter provider to host an application they use internally. Do they need SPLA?
No. In this example, you are the end-user. AWS has a SPLA to cover all infrastructure products they host on your behalf. If you were to use AWS as a datacenter provider to host SharePoint to your end customers employees; you would pay AWS for Windows and SQL and report on your SPLA SharePoint SAL licenses.
I have 25 Linux machines that I host for my customers. Do I need SPLA?
No. You have 25 Linux machines. If you had 24 Linux machines and 1 Windows VM, you would have to license the host machine to cover that Windows VM through SPLA.
My reseller told me I didn’t need SPLA because the access qualifies for Self-Hosted. The auditors told me it does not qualify. Why?
All software used to deploy the solution has to be self-hosted eligible. I bet you are running an application that does not qualify as part of your solution. This would be SPLA. Secondly, if you did not buy the software with software assurance, that is out of compliant.
Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man
Tags: Amazon licensing, Amazon Web Services, AWS, Azure, CSP Licensing, Datacenter outsourcing, EMR and SPLA, Epic Software and SPLA, Kcura hosting, License Mobility, Linux Hosting, Linux VM's, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Cloud, Microsoft Cloud Solution Program, Microsoft Exchange Server, Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft SPLA, Microsoft SQL, SAL, Self Hosted, Self-Hosted for ISV, Service Provider License Agreement, SPLA Compliance, SQL Licensing, Subscriber Access License, User Subscription License, VDI and SPLA, Windows Hosting
SPLA Licensing 