I want to be able to setup an asset in kace for office pro plus and have it deduct from the number of licenses allotted by our microsoft enterprise agreement. Software asset management is the process of managing and tracking your software assets. Customers who take licensing compliance seriously and have a robust internal software asset management sam process are likely to be better prepared for license compliance verifications. Microsoft licensing and software assurance when do you need it i am a strong advocate of only paying for what you need when it comes to software licensing and maintenance. Microsoft software asset management license dashboard. Microsoft enterprise agreement ea assist version 1. Accredited providers in the microsoft sam managed service program are experts in helping organizations gain and maintain control over it costs, risks, and complexity, while providing insights and recommendations for getting the most value from software investments.
The glossary presents over 200 sam and licensing terms. Typically, 80 90% of the software used in your business will be from microsoft and your agreement with them means that you must be fully licensed to use their. Hosting providers that want to offer software services to their customers and include software licenses as part of their service offering should use microsoft service provider license agreement spla. Software audits can catch you offguard, but they can come up more frequently than you think. Whether you have inhouse legal and software asset management teams or not, we can get you in a position to feel ready to be audited, saving you money and disruption.
Apr 09, 2020 with audit feature of asset management software, you can check the lifecycle of the asset to know on which day month this asset was assigned to compare usage of assets. What is microsoft license compliance verification commonly known as audit. Microsoft software asset management sam solutions offer the proven processes and software you need to help your customers manage, protect, and optimize it assetsand drive their businesses forward. David foxen is a software asset management expert and enthusiast. Trackplan is a cloudbased computeraided facility management cafm and maintenance management cmms solution designed for businesses of all sizes it offers job management, scheduling, planned maintenance and compliance management, site and asset management, stock and asset parts, electronic forms inspections and risk assessments, contractor. You can also do this for microsoft or nonmicrosoft software that was purchased by other means. For microsoft enterprise agreements, next generation software asset management tools can estimate upcoming trueup payments based on software utilization. Software asset management engagements are usually conducted by thirdparty auditors or consultants, but there is no obligation that the auditor in a sam engagement to be independent. Following is an example of a clause from a microsoft volume licensing agreement. Microsoft is asserting that enterprise customers have the wrong idea about the asset management investigations its partners tout as a way to save money on software licensing. With audit feature of asset management software, you can check the lifecycle of the asset to know on which day month this asset was assigned to compare usage of assets. Built on industry recognised software asset management sam tools, ea assist is a managed service comprising of advisory services, license baseline management and license optimisation support.
I mention both terms because many of the resellers ive talked to have often known that ngvl was available but thought the mpsa wasnt or vice versa. Microsoft will request that the target allow a third party to audit its software installations and report the results directly to them. Anglepoint blog software asset management anglepoint. Fotowares digital asset management system keeps track of all your videos, images and documents fotowares digital asset management software manages all your videos, images, graphics and documents, and lets you easily find, use, organize, manage, and share your digital assets in a beautiful web ui. Workflow solutions to automate tasks across the entire asset management lifecycle. There are many definitions of software asset management sam, but lets focus on itils definition for the purposes of this blog as many others have a similar themefocus. See additional information or the microsoft sam stepbystep animated training. A member of the iso standards wg21, david is a massive itam geek, so uses any opportunity to talk about the subject to whoever will listen. Trackplan is a cloudbased computeraided facility management cafm and maintenance management cmms solution designed for businesses of all sizes it offers job management, scheduling, planned maintenance and compliance management, site and asset management, stock and asset parts, electronic forms inspections and risk assessments, contractor management, job requests, cost and budget. Spla is the only microsoft volume licensing program that enables microsoft products to be used for commercial hosting. There is a misperception around software asset management and. Oem, retail full packaged product, and volume licensing agreements.
Software licensing agreements have increasingly become more complex. Provide ability to track and manage disparate license types e. You need to know which experts can assist you to solve complex issues if the situation demands it. Our collaboration with blay is a good example of this. Microsoft product nor amend or modify the terms of your volume licensing agreement with microsoft. Software asset management includes built in software license calculation intelligence, easily applied to software entitlements without writing a single line of code. Having ran a sam programme which had in cases been used as a pseudo revenue generation engine, the message was met with a degree of. We offer multiple agreement options to help partners license microsoft cloud services and onpremises software. Key advantages to software and it asset management.
Itam best practices and licensing considerations part ii. It enables the creation of an effective license position and matches complex entitlements to ensure that all licenses are optimized. Hardware primary user, machine cpu age, peripherals. According to the information technology infrastructure library itil, sam is defined as all of the infrastructure and processes. Get a description of all installations of microsoft software products on all physical servers and virtual machines used to offer hosted services. Microsoft software asset management sam replied on august 28, 2015 you can confirm the legitimacy of microsoft sam by asked the sam rep to provide a snapshot of your volume license purchase history. Software giant microsoft has announced that they are to retire 12 partner competencies over the next 18 months, including software asset management. Deliver a comprehensive solution for tracking managing enterprise assets. Top 200 sam terms a glossary of software asset management. Software asset management considerations when using ibm flexpoints. Theres a selfaudit, mentioned in some volume licensing contracts, where. A good software asset manager has aboveaverage knowledge of software license metrics, software contracts and measuring software use. Microsoft offers software asset management for corporations across the globe. Am i able to setup our kace kbox1100 appliance to deduct software assets from our microsoft enterprise agreement.
Let us help you understand and manage your software licensing agreements sla and software asset management sam. A light buzz is going around the microsoft licensing world about the ngvl microsoft next generation volume licensing and a new agreement called mpsa microsoft product and services agreement. The move has caused something of a stir in the sam world, with some commenting that microsoft no longer cares about software asset management and that it sees cloud as the answer to all licensing ills. Microsoft recently produced a blog of its own dedicated to explaining microsofts software asset management sam programme and distinction between sam practices and compliance oriented audit activities.
Wherever you are in the process of implementing software asset management sam in your business, this web page provides information to help you go. This report is aimed at those in management with little experience in licensing faced with the challenges of software asset management. Manage software license agreements for pcs running the. Microsoft intune lets you add and manage license agreement information for software that was purchased through microsoft volume licensing. The kace asset management appliance ama provides comprehensive and flexible software and hardware asset management capabilities across a variety of platforms, and helps you play a strategic role in supporting cost controls and the alignment of software contracts and purchases with actual consumption.
For example, we have a request in for 1215 office pro plus installations. Microsoft software asset management sam solutions offer the proven processes and software you need to help your customers manage, protect, and optimize it assets. Software asset management sam managed service program the microsoft sam managed service program is designed to provide customers with a continual, governancebased service to help them more effectively manage their it assets and processes. These calculations are automatically run weekly or on. By eliminating waste and empowering it departments to centralize licensing contract management, it managers understand their software. Typically, 80 90% of the software used in your business will be from microsoft and your agreement with them means that you must be fully licensed to use their products. Mpsa works best for organizations that want to license microsoft onpremises software, cloud services, or both as neededwith no organizationwide commitment. Making sure you are prepared for an audit is essential. A microsoft license compliance verification is a routine process of checking customers compliance with microsoft licensing agreements. To provide tools that allow customers to more easily inventory and manage assets across their enterprise. It also enables other microsoft stakeholders to understand the best available option for them. As more and more personal devices access company networks, cybersecurity threats continue to increase dramatically.
Software asset management sam is a set of proven it practices that unite people, processes, and technology to control and optimize the use of software across an organization. He had a vast experience of successfully implementing sam, sam tools and also made huge cost savings. By using this asset management you can audit the assets be it hardware assets, software licenses or contracts at any given time using asset audit feature. The reports provide information about hardware, license management, and software. Software asset management engagements are usually conducted by thirdparty auditors or consultants, but there is no obligation that the auditor in a sam engagement be independent. Jul, 2017 microsoft recently produced a blog of its own dedicated to explaining microsofts software asset management sam programme and distinction between sam practices and compliance oriented audit activities. Asset intelligence introduction configuration manager. It may also help software asset managers and licensing experts convey information to their management. According to the information technology infrastructure library itil, sam is defined as all of the infrastructure and processes necessary for the effective management. Microsoft intune lets you add and manage license agreement information for software that was purchased through microsoft volume licensing agreements. Microsoft offers valuable software asset management services to help small. Snows sam platform empowers the software asset manager in all aspects of licensing relating to microsoft products. License compliance verification faq microsoft volume. For more information about reports in configuration manager, see reporting.
Software asset management sam is a business practice that involves managing and optimizing the purchase, deployment, maintenance, utilization, and disposal of software applications within an organization. Jul 16, 2015 david foxen is a software asset management expert and enthusiast. License compliance verification faq microsoft volume licensing. The asset intelligence reports are located in the configuration manager console, in the monitoring workspace, in the asset intelligence folder under the reporting node. Aug 19, 2010 walking away from a microsoft licensing agreement when finances are tight its not uncommon for companies to start expiring their maintenance contracts, including software maintenance.
Microsoft thinks enterprise customers have the wrong idea about the asset. For microsoft select and select plus agreements, the tools can show point consumption over time, for each enrolment. Software asset management is the business strategy for reclaiming budget and maximizing savings by actively controlling and automating procurement, usage, and deployment of software licenses. Manage and optimize the most complex multivendor software licensing challenges. All of the infrastructure and processes necessary for the effective management, control and protection of the software assets within an. As with any maintenance agreement that is allowed to expire, its important that an organization understand the full implications of their actions so that it is.
Having ran a sam programme which had in cases been used as a pseudo revenue generation engine, the message was met with a degree of scepticism by. A member of the iso standards wg21, david is a massive itam geek, so uses any opportunity to talk about the subject to whoever will. Sometimes, businesses will increase the number of employees using their software or change how they use it without updating their software licences. Walking away from a microsoft licensing agreement when finances are tight its not uncommon for companies to start expiring their maintenance contracts, including software maintenance. See why software asset management is now an industry best practice as more and more personal devices access company networks, cybersecurity threats continue to increase dramatically.