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Category: Cloud Series

Bring Your Own License (BYOL) Rules on Third-Party Cloud Providers

Posted on by Hailey Austin

Bring Your Own License (BYOL) Rules on Third Party Cloud Providers

Software licensing is ridiculously confusing, and its hyper complexity is not slowing down anytime soon. This confusion can easily lead to overspending, which equates to more money in the software vendor’s pockets, taken at the expense of your company’s software budget. how does overspending occur? One key reason behind our client’s overspending stems from the complexity of Bring Your Own License rules (BYOL) on their third-party cloud providers. 

At MetrixData360, we have helped hundreds of companies save millions of dollars, in this article, we will clear the waters by showing you the steps you can take to mitigate any potential areas of overspending in your software licensing environment.

 

 

 

Rule Change 

Microsoft changed its rules as of 1st October 2019 around how Microsoft products are licensed in 3rd party hosting scenarios.  These changes primarily impact AWS, Google, and Alibaba clouds (although others are affected).  The concept of Bring Your Own Licenses (BYOL) is influenced significantly by these changes.  Before these changes, as long as you had hardware dedicated to your use (i.e., were not using shared infrastructure), you could BYOL now.  With these changes, you may be required to purchase subscription licenses for these products through the hoster (e.g., Windows Servers, Office).  Specific versions may still be licensed via BYOL if licenses were acquired for those products before October 2019 or on a contract still active as of October 2019. 

 

To understand these rights, you must review the Microsoft Product Terms.  Below are the relevant sections: 

 

 

  1. Customers may use the server software on a Licensed Server, provided it acquires sufficient Server Licenses as described below. 

  

A Licensed Server is: 

A Licensed Server means a single Server, dedicated to the Customer’s use, to which a License is assigned.  Dedicated Servers that are under the management or control of an entity other than the Customer or one of its Affiliates are subject to the Outsourcing Software Management clause.  For purposes of this definition, a hardware partition or blade is considered to be a separate Server. 

  

 

The Outsourcing Software Management clause states: 

Customers may install and use licensed copies of the software on Servers and other devices that are under the day-to-day management and control of Authorized Outsourcers, provided all such Servers and other devices are and remain fully dedicated to Customer’s use.  The customer is responsible for all of the obligations under its volume licensing agreement regardless of the physical location of the hardware upon which the software is used.  Except as expressly permitted here or elsewhere in these Product Terms, the Customer is not permitted to install or use licensed copies of the software on Servers and other devices that are under the management or control of a third party. 

  

Authorized Outsourcer means any third-party service provider that is not a Listed Provider and is not using Listed Provider as a Data Center Provider as part of the outsourcing service. 

  

AWS is a Listed Provider.  Next, we need to determine if we have a right to utilize software at the Listed Providers through Microsoft License Mobility through Software Assurance right: 

 

License Mobility through Software Assurance 

Under License Mobility Through Software Assurance (SA), Customer may move its licensed software to shared servers under any of its Licenses which are designated as having License Mobility for which it has SA, subject to the requirements below.  Products used for Self-Hosting may be used at the same time under License Mobility through SA rights, subject to the limitations of the Self-Hosting License Terms.  

  

Permitted Use: 

With License Mobility through SA, Customer may: 

      • Run its licensed software on shared servers;  
      • Access that software under access licenses and for which it has SA, and under its User and Device SLs that permit access to the Products;  
      • Manage its OSEs that it uses on shared servers; and/or  
      • Manage its OSEs that it uses on its servers using software that it runs on shared servers. 

  

Requirements: 

To use License Mobility through SA, the Customer must: 

      • Run its licensed software and manage its OSEs on shared servers under the terms of its volume licensing agreement;  
      • Deploy its Licenses only with Microsoft Azure Services or qualified License Mobility through Software Assurance Partner; and 
      • Complete and submit the License Mobility Validation form with each License Mobility through Software Assurance Partner who will run its licensed software on their shared servers. 

  

License Mobility allows for use on a shared server.  Products that have this right associated with them allow BYOL (as long as you have active Software Assurance).  Next, we need to see if a product has Server Mobility.  For Windows Server: 

 

4. Software Assurance 

 

Windows Server does not include License Mobility rights.  For Windows Server (or any product without License Mobility), this means BYOL is only available for versions that were released before October 2019 and for which licenses were acquired prior (or on active contracts as of October 2019) to October 2019 

 

 

Please refer to the current Product Terms to ensure this info is still accurate as Microsoft makes changes frequently to their licensing rules. 

 

Start Saving on Your Software Licensing

Being able to cut software licensing costs will mean money back into the IT department for smarter and more innovative investments. This can be done by tracking the life cycles of your assets through the successful deployment of an inventory tool (along with someone who can effectively read it), through having a clear understanding of usage during contract negotiations, carefully considering your migration to the Cloud, and by conducting internal audits to ensure compliance.

At Metrixdata360, we can help you cut down your costs to save you from unnecessary drains on your budget and potentially heavy audit penalties. Don’t put off saving money, get your free consultation today!

Microsoft Azure: The Pros and Cons

Posted on by Mike Austin

Hot on the heels of Amazon’s Web Services (AWS) is Microsoft’s Azure. While not has large as AWS, Microsoft’s budding thought child serves as an ideal cloud solution to those completely addicted to Microsoft’s services. In 2017, Gartner named Microsoft Azure as a leader in the cloud infrastructure-as-a-service space. While Microsoft is quick to stroke its own ego, what are the real advantages and disadvantages of signing up for Microsoft Azure? At MetrixData 360, we want your experience in the cloud to be as pain-free as possible and we have helped many of our clients turn that goal into a reality, so in this article we’ll dive into a detailed picture of what it will actually be like to move to Azure.

Microsoft Azure Pros

High Availablility and Uptime

While Microsoft is not as large as AWS, Azure still is the second largest cloud platform in the industry today, with datacenters found in several different regions, making it ideal for international businesses. Although it should be noted that Azure is not available in every country, and although Azure will only store your data in regions where you permit it to be stored, you need to make sure that you pick a region where your data is allowed to be hosted. Azure also promises a 99.995% uptime rate — an impressive accomplishment in the Cloud Industry.

Flexibility

Moving to the cloud can be an expensive experience, so it is important for businesses to make the most of their cloud platform once they are there. This flexibility is important, as it will enable you to scale up your projects as your business continues to grow. Azure proves to be an easily scalable platform and barely a few clicks of a button will get you the additional licenses you may need. Imagine being able to scale down your software environment over the weekend or scaling up only for your busiest days of the year. Microsoft on-prem licensing can often prove quite difficult to remove licenses from, particularly the Enterprise Agreement (EA), which makes the easy adjustability of the Azure solutions a breath of fresh air, especially in this time of unpredictability.

Related: What is Microsoft’s Cloud Solution Provider program?

Security

One of the most appealing features that Azure has to offer its clients is a state of the art security system following a ADADSC approach: Detect, Assess, Diagnose, Stabilize, and Close. They have proven to be the leading force in IaaS security and have received multiple compliance certifications for their high standards. Their security features are both reliable and user-friendly with protections like multi-factor authentication and password requirements.

Cons of Microsoft Azure

Complexity

As a SaaS platform, Azure can easily become an extremely complicated environment for larger companies. Before the cloud, there was an extremely rigorous process when it came to purchasing more licenses, usually in the form of a negotiation or a contract renewal. On the other hand, with the cloud it is easy to purchase new products; all you need is a company credit card and an afternoon. Many companies do not have any sort of processes to regulate the spending of employees when confronted with their cloud platform. It will require management and strict processes to make sure purchasing is controlled, environments are well managed, and projects are closed after they have reached their conclusion. For larger companies, it will be worth investigating a SaaS management solution, along with someone specially trained to manage your Azure platform.

Data Transfer

Azure services are all subject to data transfer fees that are often the cause of stacked hidden fees. This is not unique to Azure as all of the large cloud services like AWS and Google do this same gouging of their customer base. This separate fee for in and out data can prove quite costly for large companies, so you should be aware of this to avoid any surprises.

Support

Despite their high-quality products and global reach, Microsoft is not very good at dealing with the sheer volume of their customers and treating each customer as a unique individual. Anyone who has tried to get Microsoft’s attention would be able to tell you that. However, as a cloud service provider, that is one thing that Microsoft will have to do on a regular basis as companies run into technical issues and server problems that must be handled quickly. To answer this, Microsoft’s Cloud Solution Provider Program (CSP) allows companies to experience better customer service.

Complicated Pricing

Controlling cost in Azure can be a daunting task that warrants its own book; however, touching briefly on the subject, Azure solutions are structured to encompass many stand-alone services. Each service also has complimentary services that are needed to run the services that you are after. For instance, simply wanting an application and a database will also require you to purchase some form of storage and networking. In addition, you must also consider additional fees such as transfer costs and backups which can act as sneaky hidden fees.

As such, building your unique Azure solution involves combining these multiple factors based on your preference, which means calculating your exact price can be difficult.

In an attempt to make things easier, Microsoft has a universal pricing metric based on the hourly rate, so estimating cost comes down to estimating how long you will be using each service. If you want to figure out cost, you should seek to understand the full scope of the services that you will consume in order to effectively calculate how much each service will cost. However, if you have multiple services running at once, each with their own pricing, it is easy to understand how such a task can quickly get away from you.

Getting Your Azure Spending Under Control

Moving to the Cloud can be a new and exciting time, and it is important that you have a strong understanding of what you need and how it will be used in order to create a unique solution that best suits the needs of your business. This will keep your cost at a minimum and your performance at its highest. At MetrixData 360, We specialize in assisting companies who wish to lower their cloud spending through license optimization practices. For more information on how MetrixData 360 as helps many of its clients successfully migrate to the cloud you can check out our cloud service page.

Get in Touch with an Azure Expert Today:

Azure Active Directory

Posted on by Mike Austin

Taking your organization’s Active Directory to the Cloud can be an exciting and complicated event that businesses have had to do in some capacity over the past year in order to survive. Perhaps the initial transition was nothing but scaffolding, a hastily compiled structure that could accommodate your organization’s needs for the time being. But now that you are settled in your new Cloud space, you might want to make an important and permanent transition in hosting your Active Directory in the Cloud. It is obviously not as simple as copying and pasting your Active Directory’s data (if only it was!) but at MetrixData 360, we are here to help you with the transition, as we have helped many of our clients prepare for their move to the Cloud. So, what does a cloud-based Active Directory look like? How will it differ from your on-prem system as it currently exists? Keep reading and find out.

What is Active Directory

To know where you’re going, let’s look at where you’re coming from. At its most basic, your Active Directory is a directory service which allows for wide-reaching control over the desktops and users in your organization’s software infrastructure. The AD stores users, passwords, devices, and licensing entitlements, just to name a few. Since it is a single interface that stores a wealth of data, it is often extremely valuable for the IT department to deploy new technology, ensure compliance and optimization. As you might guess, the safety and accuracy of the data within the AD must be a top priority for organizations since the AD cannot deliver peak performance and results if the data it stores is not accurate and secure.

Related: Need a primer on Active Directory before moving to the cloud?

If you have spent any time on the Internet, you may have been asked to create a free online account by almost every website you’ve come across. The same is true when it comes to SaaS applications; in order to track users, every user needs an account for every application they will use, which means that every user may have dozens of usernames and passwords that the administration department will need to keep track of. For organizations with over a thousand employees, you can understand how quickly this could get away from you. This is where Azure Active Directory comes in. Azure AD provides users with a single username and password in order to access all the applications they have a license to use. In addition to keeping track of all the users in its system, Azure AD can also be used to:

  • Monitor access to applications
  • Provision Users
  • Enable federation between organizations
  • Extend existing on-prem AD implementations to your Azure AD

The Inherent Nature of the Cloud

Moving to the Cloud comes with Cloud related advantages and drawbacks and the Azure AD is no exception to this rule. As is the general nature of the Cloud, Azure AD’s main advantage is that the hardware and software needed for the operation of its service is hosted elsewhere, meaning you do not have to handle maintenance, deployment and security, your cloud solutions provider will take care of that. Pricing is much simpler being that you only pay month-to-month and pay only for what you are using, although Microsoft does still reward large upfront payments and yearlong commitments.

Related:Beware these common cloud migration problems

Main Benefits of Azure AD

  • Allows users to have a single log-in and password for every applicable SaaS application that your organization has on the Cloud.
  • Provide users with the ability to access these Cloud services from anywhere, allowing for secure remote access
  • Effectively manage your SaaS applications in a single location, increasing control, organization and security
  • Highly scalable at low costs compared to on-prem counterparts
  • High quality security at your fingertips

Azure AD Editions

There are a few options you can pick from when it comes to Azure AD, each with their own advantages and disadvantages.

  • Azure AD Free Edition

This version comes as a free edition available to every Azure subscription and offers a maximum 500,000 Directory Object creations. The only drawback with this edition is that it is not applicable with Microsoft paid services and applications like O365 and Intune.

  • Azure AD Basic

Allowing you to be both productive and cost-effective, Azure AD basic provides central cloud application access and self-service identity management solutions for the task worker who wants their infrastructure to exist exclusively in the Cloud. Basic also comes with many cost-reducing features like group-based access management, self-service password resets, and Azure AD Application Proxy.

  • Azure AD Premium P1

Premium P1 offers its customers a more empowered experience, with the ability to perform more demanding tasks in identification and access management. The P1 also comes with a wide variety of enterprise-level features to help improve identity management capabilities and allows hybrid users to access both on-prem and cloud services. Ideal for information workers, with the bonus of having Microsoft Identity Manager for on-prem identification and access management, P1 offers a full suite of options for security, identity management, and access management.

  • Azure Premium P2

    The Premium P2 encompasses all the features of the other editions plus some added features, including Identity Protection and Privileged Identity Management, allowing top of the line security for your organization’s most sensitive data.

Integrating Azure AD with On-prem Active Directory

If you currently have an on-prem Active Directory Solution and are thinking about moving to the Cloud, there is no need to choose between Active Directory on-prem and Azure AD since you can potentially have both. The two systems can be blended seamlessly, for instance, if you are using Office 365, you can have the usernames and passwords of users managed by on-prem AD while Azure AD takes care of the network logons while synchronizing the two systems so that if details are changed both ADs are updated.

Getting Your Azure AD Solution Under Control

Microsoft Azure AD is a great way for your company to improve the organization of your infrastructure on the Cloud, but it won’t matter how organized you are if you are not compliant. At MetrixData 360, we help our clients ensure they can safely transfer their applications to the Cloud without running the risk of falling out of compliance. This will provide you with the peace of mind of knowing exactly what you have deployed in your environment and that you can use it. For more information on our services, you can check out our MetrixData 360 Cloud Services page.



Top Cloud Providers

Posted on by Mike Austin

Are you shopping for a new place to store your data on the Cloud or are you moving there for the first time? It may be easy to assume that your only options are AWS, Azure, and Google. But while it’s true these giants claim a huge chunk of the marketplace, they are not the only options you have. We’ve put together a who’s who of the top cloud providers outside the Big 3. 

Related: Take a closer look at how those companies compare.

Whatever brings you into the Cloud market, there’s something here for everyone. It’s important you pick a provider that gives you a solid solution that is right for you.

At MetrixData 360, we’re in the business of making sure your Cloud migration is smooth and painless with as few unneeded expenses as possible from a software licensing perspective. So, in this article we’ll go over a few of the hottest cloud providers of 2020 who act as suitable alternatives to the big three and see which one is right for you.

Why Go for a Small Cloud Provider?

Bigger is always better right? Not necessarily. Smaller cloud providers have an advantage over the larger cloud providers when it comes to the following areas:

  • Customer Relations:

If you’ve ever had a customer service issue to bring up with the large companies, then you’ll know how long they tend to keep you waiting and how little time they have to deal with individual problems. With smaller providers you get to be treated less like a number and more like a person.

  • Specialization:

While companies like AWS have their hand in almost everything, smaller companies are allowed to have a more narrowed focus and create the most effective strategy for their unique solution.

  • Tailored Services:
    Larger companies tend to have a generic, one-size fits all price. However, since smaller providers usually have to do more to survive, they will often make tailored solutions based on your specific needs, budget, and requirements.
  • Innovative Solutions:

Smaller companies need something that makes them stand out and this often leads to innovative products and services.

Top Small Cloud Platforms of 2021

Since Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and Amazon Web Services make up more than 50% of the cloud platform marketshare, it’s only natural that they would show up in anyone’s search for a cloud platform. But that market saturation tends to wash out smaller players who can often provide just as much or more value as the big 3, and sometimes at a better rate.

Oracle Cloud

Perhaps a little bit of a late bloomer when compared to its competition like Amazon and Azure, Oracle has still proven to be a reliable product and shows steady growth.

Although Oracle does have a hand in both the PaaS and the IaaS industries, Oracle is primarily a software provider, covering companies that range from small start-ups to enterprises. For this reason, SaaS will be Oracle’s trump card, along with their autonomous database services. Oracle also offers hybrid solutions for their cloud customers.

Pros

  • Computing capabilities
  • Adjustable storage settings
  • Large storage services for low cost

Cons

  • Limited integration with other software
  • Limited tutorials
  • No keyboard shortcuts

Cisco

Cisco has become a collection of multi-cloud products and applications, creating for its customers complete freedom when it comes to workload placement, with its main appeal being Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI). It has partnerships with Azure and AWS, with expected expansion into Google Cloud, proving ideal for multi-cloud deployments and hybrid solutions.

Pros

  • Highly secure, open and flexible solution
  • Allows you to connect to a large ecosystem of cloud providers

Cons

Kamatera Cloud

Kamatera is known for its low prices in Cloud services and high-performance infrastructure offering reliable performance and unhindered availability, making it suitable for businesses of all sizes.

Kamatera also tempts its customers with tailor-made VPS hosting and offering you full access to their Management Platform features.

In 2018, FinancesOnline awarded Kamatera the Great User Experience and Rising Star awards. Part of what won them those awards are their around the clock, 7 days a week, all year-round tech support (and you’ll talk to an actual human, how exciting!). Their data centers stretch across four continents to provide global support and the promise of 99.95% uptime guaranteed.

Pros

  • 100% free 30-day trial with no hidden fees or commitments
  • Limitless scalability and storage
  • Simplified and user-friendly cloud server management
  • Able to add server when required
  • Add the database of your choice

Cons

  • A few of their customers have noted slower response times

Rackspace

Offering their expertise in several different cloud services, such as dedicated hosting, AWS, Microsoft, and OpenStack, Rackspace has an excellent reputation for innovation and was named the leading hosting provider in Internet Retail for three years in a row.

Pros

Cons

  • Little to offer in the way of shared hosting plan
  • While you will always find someone on staff to answer your phone calls, poor customer reviews often complain that employees are undertrained

Alibaba Cloud

Alibaba has really taken off in the Asian markets, acting as the single largest enterprise-only Cloud provider. The Chinese company has a wide array of high-performing services very similar to AWS, including data storage, relational databases, big data processing, content delivery networks, just to name a few.

Pros

  • Servers are configured so that websites are totally isolated from one another (one website going down won’t take out the whole server)
  • Great range of products for enterprises
  • Very detailed in their documentation

Cons

  • The regular hosting plan might seem limited (5GB of disk space, 1GM MySQL 5.6 database and 1,000 concurrent connections)
  • Despite its global network, Alibaba’s data centers are only located in the US and Hong Kong
  • Complicated interface and installers

VMware Cloud Horizon

While perhaps still smaller than the giants of the industry, VMware Cloud Horizon still remains a heavy hitter, with a global network and services that are paired with reasonable prices.

The main benefits of VMware Cloud Horizon is its security, its unified management, its maximum flexibility and its high availability promising 99.99% uptime with confidence.

Pros

Cons

  • Designing architecture can be a confusing task
  • Flash management console can be sluggish
  • There are no migration paths, which requires you to start from zero

SAP

SAP Cloud Platform has gained a small but loyal fanbase of businesses of all sizes. Its main appeal comes from its high scalability, its top-quality support, and its valuable features like data synchronization and negotiable pricing.

Pros

Cons

  • Struggles with API management
  • Lacks stability and flexibility

Questions to Ask Your New Cloud Provider

The first step in picking a good partner is asking what kind of services they provide. Many people move to the Cloud for a variety of different reasons: to save money, remove the hassle of managing software architecture on-prem, or to increase your economies of scale.

To know what kind of answer you’re looking for, you’ll need to know what your cloud computing needs are. This will dictate the type of services you’ll require.

Security

You’ll want to know how secure this provider is and their capabilities of storing and protecting your data. Make sure they have standard security measures in place and are constantly striving to improve.

  • Do they have firewalls and anti-virus detection?
  • What about data encryption and security audits?

Make sure you are completely comfortable in handing over your data.

It’s also a good idea to make sure your Provider adheres to the legislation specific to your industry regarding data management, privacy, and security.

Data Centers

You will want to know where your provider’s data centers are located and if those data centers are compatible with where your company will be working. You will also want to know how safe these data centers are.

  • Are they protected from natural disasters, theft, and other events that could result in the loss of your data?
  • What will happen if your provider loses your data?
  • Will you be compensated for the loss?
  • What kind of downtime history do these data centers have, and whether you will be unable to access your data for an extended period?

As the function of your business becomes dependent on your ability to access the internet, ideally this number should be zero. You should also ask what Disaster Recovery solutions they have in place regarding data redundancies.

If you’d like more information on how to properly license for disaster recovery, you can check out our new article: Licensing a Disaster Recovery Environment in Oracle.

Scalability of Architecture

As your business grows, it is important to make sure that your cloud provider can compensate for your growth.

  • What is their storage capacity and what sort of additional services will you need as your business grows to new heights?
  • And will this provider be able to meet those new demands as they arise?

When it comes to the Cloud, there might be several overwhelming options to pick from, especially when confronted with choosing a provider. Switching providers can be a nightmare, so it’s always best to get it right the first time.

At Metrixdata 360, we have helped many clients successfully migrate to the Cloud with as little expense as possible; we make sure that everything is organized in regard to your licensing so that when you move to the Cloud, you won’t take your compliance issues with you.

If you’d like to learn more, you can check out our Cloud Migration page.

The Pros and Cons of Microsoft’s CSP: Is it Right for You?

Posted on by Ben Tight

Microsoft’s Cloud Solution Provider Program has begun to build momentum in the software industry, and it may have caught your attention as an appealing option for Cloud deployment. If you are considering purchasing from Microsoft’s CSP program, it’s important that you weigh the pros and cons in order to carefully consider what is right for your business.

At MetrixData 360, we like to keep a finger on the pulse of the software industry, and, as such, we’ve noticed many of our customers are coming to us with questions about the CSP program and if it’s right for them.

In this article, we’ll go into the details of the CSP program and its benefits and drawbacks for potential customers.

What is Microsoft’s CSP Program?

The Cloud Solution Provider Program is a new way Microsoft intends to sell licenses and manage client’s accounts.

Instead of Microsoft selling licenses directly to their customers, they will be selling their licenses to Direct CSP Distributors, who in turn will either sell to Indirect CSP Resellers or to you, the customer. Indirect CSP Resellers will also sell directly to customers.

As a customer, you don’t have to interact with Microsoft and instead will merely have to manage the relationship with your Reseller and/or Distributor. Your Reseller or Distributor will handle relations with Microsoft and will represent you to Microsoft over any outstanding issues.

Your Reseller or Distributor will provide you with anything related to your customer experience, including negotiating exclusive discounts, customized bundles, support, maintenance etc.

Pros of the CSP Program

Monthly Payment Models

One of the main appeals that draws customers to the CSP is the month-to-month payment models that CSP offers.

This allows you to adjust for seasonal influxes of workers and customers alike. Not only is it easy to scale up, it is easy to scale down, which is not a feature found in Microsoft’s Enterprise Agreement (EA).

With the EA, while it was simple and almost expected for customers to add licenses to their final count at every true-up, it would be painful and almost impossible to remove any licenses, which often left customers feeling forced to buy more than they needed simply to maintain their EA level status and to keep Microsoft happy.

With the CSP, while there are other long term payment models available, there are no such restrictions that limit you to locking yourself in, and you are free to add and drop licenses from month-to-month as your needs dictate.

The billing that you receive is also supposed to be more detailed than that of the EA, allowing you to easily track your spending.

Related: Get More Details on How the EA Compares with Microsoft’s CSP.

No Minimum Commitment

Microsoft’s EA required its customers to meet many rather tedious requirements in order to maintain their pricing level and the discounts that go along with it. These pricing levels are primarily dictated by the number of seats you need, and as of 2016, the minimum seats you need to qualify for the EA at all was raised from 250 to 500 seats.

This leaves a lot of mid-sized businesses in that 250-500 employee range in the lurch and looking for alternatives that will not force them to pay for licenses they don’t need.

This is where the CSP program comes in; with the CSP program, there are no minimum commitments you need to adhere to. This makes CSP ideal for mid-sized businesses and many former EA customers are expected to switch to the CSP for that very reason.

There is also no minimum length of time you need to stay in the CSP program. With the EA, you typically needed to sign up for a three-year agreement, and during that time you could easily add licenses but you couldn’t easily dip below your original agreement count.

With the CSP however, there is no minimum seat requirement and no length of time you have to commit to, giving you complete freedom in how long you stay and how much you use.

You Get to Work with Your CSP Partner

As an individual consumer, you might know the pain of trying to get Microsoft’s attention. As excellent as they are at selling products, they often have difficulty providing meaningful customer service to every one of their customers simply by the sheer size of their business.

You can often feel like you’re little more than a number to them, which is why the CSP partner program offers a more engaging and personalized experience. Since your CSP partner will be handling the relationship with Microsoft, you will only have to handle your relationship with your CSP partner, whose role in this chain is to provide you with an ideal customer experience.

This means that they will be offering you around the clock support, assistance in migrating to the Cloud, and customizable solutions hand-tailored to your organization’s requirements.

In order to stand out in the market, CSP partners will be eager to provide you with deals and enticing offers and will often be more willing to negotiate pricing and bundles compared to dealing directly with Microsoft.

Related: Worried about your Upcoming EA True-Up? Check out our article to get ready.

It’s Where Microsoft is Clearly Pushing Their Clients Anyway

It’s clear that Microsoft has a vision and that’s one where their platform, products, and business exist exclusively on the Cloud. They’ve been quite aggressive in growing their Azure platform, which is now sitting second to only AWS in size and selection.

They also have begun steadily making their Enterprise Agreement less appealing to mid-size businesses and pushing their clients into other revenues, including Microsoft’s CSP. In 2016, they announced that the number of minimum seats required for companies to possess an EA would jump from 250 seats to 500.

In 2018, Microsoft also removed programmatic discounts offered to Level A customers with a seat count between 250-2,399 seats, significantly deteriorating the previously superior pricing of the EA compared to other volume license programs. At MetrixData 360, we think this deterioration of the EA will continue eventually even to the Level B customers. The reason for this is a bit multi-layered but essentially, what the EA provided for customers was direct access to Microsoft, they could negotiate custom-made deals and required a large quantity of Microsoft’s time and money supporting customer-service infrastructures. What the CSP does is it allows the CSP partners to present to their customer’s a more fixed, non-negotiable pricing while also giving the CSP partners the task of handling customer relations.

While you should always make your business decisions in accordance with the goals and priorities of your organization, it is important to note that Microsoft is visibly pushing away from the EA and into other avenues, including the CSP program.

Cons of CSP

It’s in the Cloud

It might be a little bit of a no brainer but the CSP program is a Cloud-only program, meaning it won’t offer products that are only available on-premises. This may be a roadblock to some organizations who require that their software and their data to remain on-prem.

For other products that are on-prem, such as servers, you will need a different license for them. With an exclusive Cloud platform comes Cloud-related problems,, including but not limited to:

  • Security Issues
  • Data Ownership
  • Lost connection leading to downtime
  • Difficult to track software assets in the Cloud, often leading to rampant spending

Related: Is your Business Ready to Migrate to the Cloud? Watch for These Common Problems!

Some of the Partners are Newer than Others to the Cloud Business

It can be a rigorous process becoming a Direct CSP distributor, and you’ll need to meet the following requirements:

  • You need to prove that you are capable of providing around the clock technical support.
  • You need to pass a credit check in order to purchase Microsoft’s support plan.
  • You need to have a customer billing structure already in place.
  • You need to already have at least one managed service, IP service, or customer solution application.
  • You need to have at least one Microsoft Gold Productivity Competency.

However, to become an Indirect CSP Reseller doesn’t require nearly the same level of prerequisites, since they’ll get most of their infrastructure, such as their billing and their technical support, from their Direct Distributor. As such, you may find that smaller and newer resellers are not as well equipped to deal with your unique business demands as they arise.

Ready for the CSP Program?

With an uncertain future ahead of us, it can be understandable to be hesitant when picking a long-term IT solution for your business. Getting saddled with a platform that will prove to only be a weight around your neck to drag you down is hardly an ideal situation.

It is always best to examine the pros and cons to figure out if CSP is best suited to your company’s software environment.

At MetrixData 360, we are offering a unique solution to help you see if your software environment is ready to make the transition to CSP. Our SAM Compass Services offers you the ability to monitor your software environment to make sure you are only using what you need in order to keep your software spending as low as it can go.

Our solution offers our customers the ability to take control of their IT budget by providing them visibility into their usage and offering more streamlined licensing solutions, with the help of our team of experts on your side.

If you’d like more information on our SAM Compass Solution, you can check out our SAM Compass Service Page.

Need a Professional Opinion? Book a Free Meeting With Us Today

Becoming Non-Compliant in the Cloud

Posted on by Ben Tight

The Cloud has made computing that much easier for companies; they are able to work from home, share files in a single location, and they can sleep easy at night knowing that all their licensing problems are a thing of the past…or are they? Unfortunately, there are some common ways companies become non-compliant in the cloud.

With pay-as-you-go pricing models and easy scalability, it would seem as though there’d be no chance to run up against any trouble in the Cloud. Still, there are a few scenarios that present compliance risks that you should be wary about as you make the transition into the Cloud.

At MetrixData 360, we have helped many of our customers transition into the Cloud smoothly and with as little impact as possible when it comes to their expenses, so let’s look at how compliance is still something to be wary of, even in the Cloud.

Compliance Issue #1: Expecting Vendors to Keep You Compliant

If you are hosting all your products on a vendor’s platform, you’d think that vendor would let you know if you were overspending or if you were using services you are not entitled to.

It’s not for their lack of knowledge – they know exactly what you’re using and how much because your servers are their servers. However, there are services on the Cloud that exist without a cap of any kind.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud is a great example of this. The product tracks social media mentions and it does not stop once you reach the limit of your mentions, it just keeps going while simply tripling your cost for its tracking efforts —meanwhile, your 20K monthly expense could jump up to 250K if left unattended.

Your software vendor will also not stop you from using services you aren’t entitled to.

For instance, if an administrator were to enable Azure Threat Protection at the domain level, they could do so, and the protection would cover every user in the domain including users that don’t have the proper license to entitle them to this protection.

This type of expectation that organizations govern themselves could leave companies having to pay up tremendous amounts of unforeseen software spend, along with non-compliance fees at their next true-up.

Compliance Issue #2: Using Expired Plans

In the case of some vendors, despite the fact that a license may have expired, its curdled remains are still accessible to their user. The only way a technical barrier is activated to a company is when every license within that organization has expired for that service.

As long as there is still a single active license, then anyone who has an expired license can still access that service, which can leave a company exposed to unexpected fees.

Compliance Issue #3: Mixing Plans

When you purchase a Microsoft 365 Subscription plan, you are signing up for the access to applications and services such as Office, Exchange, and SharePoint. These Subscription plans range from basic (F1) to top of the line and most expensive (E5).

Hidden costs can easily crop up when you mix plans. Features may be accessible to members of your organization who do not have the license to use them, which puts you into dangerous compliance risk territory.

To make matters worse, it is not exactly clear which licenses are needed to use some features. Manual configuration is advised to avoid this compliance risk.

You’ll be asked to buy extra “standalone licenses” for lower-level plans in order to compensate for users accessing high-level suites.

Compliance Issue #4: Underestimating Total Expense

The sheer nature of the pricing metric of Cloud products makes it so that it can be difficult to estimate true cost. It may seem as though two extra dollars a month won’t have that big of an impact, but once it is scaled up to your whole organization, it can leave you having to pay out a large chunk of your software budget.

One client of ours had this exact problem with an unexpected $8,000 spike in their software spend. We tracked the unexpected spending to a desktop belonging to a junior IT team member who had accidentally turned on Blob Storage for his entire company.

In the defense of the junior IT member, there had only been barely a few dollars of difference between the storage applications he had been asked to pick between, but it had cost his company a tremendous amount of unneeded spend.

How to Avoid Becoming Non-Compliant in the Cloud

While the Cloud might not be the balmy risk-free getaway promised, it can still provide your organization with the flexibility it needs to succeed, and it doesn’t have to be a budgeting nightmare if you follow these simple steps:

  • Know your contracts, what you are entitled to and what you are not, make sure administrators understand their role and responsibilities
  • Start a SaaS Management program to accompany your SAM strategy
  • Find a tool that can accommodate for your company’s Cloud migration
  • Pay close attention to users, storage and your company’s limits

Get a Handle on your Cloud Solution

The Cloud can be liberation for many companies.

However, as great as it may be, it is important that you are aware of the stumbling blocks that befall companies who head straight to the Cloud thinking it will be the end of their compliance issues, because oftentimes it is not.

Compliance gaps and audits are a massive form of revenue for Microsoft, so despite the apparent transition away from restrictive arrangements that allow for compliance gaps in the first place, you may find yourself butting heads with its Cloud equivalent.

At MetrixData 360, we are more than prepared and capable in helping you achieve your goals in the Cloud. We know how to monitor your usage with our Azure Usage Reporting tool, which can help you solve any of your Azure compliance or spending issues.

For more information, you can check out our Azure Usage Reporting Tool page here.

Cloud Agnostic vs. Cloud Enabled vs. Cloud Native: The Terms Explained 

Posted on by Ben Tight

On your way to the Cloud, you may be confronted with a lot of confusing terms while deciding on how to build your Cloud architecture. Terms like Cloud Native, Cloud Agnostic, and Cloud Enabled are often used seemingly at random.

At MetrixData 360, we have helped many of our clients successfully migrate to the cloud and we want to ensure your migration to the Cloud is successful as well.

We’re going to break down the difference between the three terms and what advantages and disadvantages each of these solutions can bring to your Cloud platform.

But, before you dive head first into the complex definitions of cloud infrastructure, we suggest you watch this video to get warmed up:

Cloud Native

Definition: What is Cloud Native?

Cloud Native is a bit of a loose term that can generally be described as the action of building and running applications that exploit the advantages of the cloud delivery model. Kind of vague, isn’t it? When you sign up for Cloud Native architecture, it’s typically only a matter of selecting a Cloud Provider and building your architecture to stick with that provider exclusively. Cloud Native architecture relies heavily on services tied to the Cloud Provider themselves, such as Azure Monitoring services in Azure or CloudWatch in AWS.

Companies go about establishing Cloud Native platforms by utilizing vendor-specific offerings like AWS’ function-as-a-service and Azure’s globally-distributed database Cosmos DB.

The Pros of Cloud Native

  • Going Cloud Native will make it much easier to create resilient cloud architecture
  • Cloud Native solutions often come with better performance, and better efficiency
  • Easily scalable and some Cloud providers offer features for load balancing like Amazon and Google.
  • Often the cheapest option, since you will be licensed based on use and storage needs and there are no software/hardware installations needed.
  • Easily maintained
  • While it is typical for architecture to be built to be platform-specific, applications can still be moved between infrastructures if necessary.

The Cons of Cloud Native

  • Services like AWS’s function-as-a-service and Azure’s Cosmos DB make you locked in with that specific vendor and makes it quite difficult to move to a different provider.
  • You will have to use native APIs, which will involve a lot of code rewriting if you ever move to a different Cloud provider

Download Our Cloud Infrastructure Guide Today

the three types of cloud infrastructure

See how enterprises across the globe configure cloud-native, enabled, and agnostic workload infrastructures to keep up with today’s volatile market.

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Cloud Native vs. Cloud Enabled Applications

As if the Cloud couldn’t be more confusing, ‘Cloud Native’ is actually a two-fold term which also may be used when referring to applications.

Not to be mistaken with Cloud Enabled applications, Cloud Native applications are ones that are built exclusively for the Cloud; they were born in the Cloud and are deployed and work best in the Cloud.  It is expected that Cloud Native applications will become the norm as time progresses, with 90% of all new apps using Cloud Native structures and an estimated 35% of all production apps being Cloud Native by 2022.  

Cloud Native Solutions are often viewed as the more attractive option since they better harness the full advantages of life in the clouds, they are designed to host multi-tenant instances and they are usually significantly cheaper than Cloud Enabled applications.

While Cloud Native and Cloud Enabled might be used interchangeably at times, they are not always discussing the exact same thing.

Cloud Enabled applications are applications which have been originally made for and in a static environment on-prem and are meant to reside on an in-house server or data center. This piece of legacy enterprise software is then simply tweaked and restructured to be enabled in the Cloud in order to offer its customer’s remotely available and easy management. While they may be similar to their Cloud native counterparts, using a Cloud Enabled application will leave you with limitations on how that application can interact with the full cloud environment, creating issues such as:

  • Slower implementation as a result of server configuration, customization, and software/hardware set up.
  • Not easily scalable and requires manual upgrades
  • Tends to be the more expensive of the three options

Vendors who offer Cloud Enabled applications might try to pass them off as Cloud Native, since Cloud Native solutions are the far more popular option on the market and are considered to be a short-hand for ‘modern applications and infrastructure practices.’

Related: Azure vs AWS vs Google Cloud: An Honest Comparison  of Which Platform is Right for You.

Cloud Agnostic

Definition: What Is Cloud Agnostic?

Being Cloud Agnostic means building your architecture to utilize everything open source technologies and portable components have to offer, this architecture is built to be able to switch providers easily, or even allow for the use of multiple cloud providers simultaneously. Unlike Cloud Native solutions, where you will typically be at the mercy of your Cloud solution provider, Cloud Agnostic gives you the freedom to forge your own path into the clouds.

The Pros of Cloud Agnostic

The Cons of Cloud Agnostic

  • Often more expensive than Cloud Native architecture (but not always, sources vary)
  • More difficult to build highly available architecture without using a Cloud Native solution
  • If you are hopping between vendors, you may not have the ability to take full advantage of the capabilities of a single vendor.
  • You will be responsible for monitoring multiple platforms at once

Getting Help for Your Migration to the Cloud

The Cloud can be a turbulent place, with so many options and muddled terms that it might be easier to stay rooted to your on-prem solution.

Software infrastructures are unique for every company, there’s no one way to do it and the same is true when it comes to building your company’s platform in the Cloud. When deciding what your Cloud platform will look like, it’s important that you know what your options are so you aren’t limited to a solution that might not be best suited your company’s objectives, goals, and budget.

At Metrixdata 360, we understand this complexity and companies desires to pick their own customizable solution, something that we prioritize when helping our clients in their transition. You stay in the driver’s seat and we ensure that your solution is as cost-effective as possible. Together, we’ll get you to where you want to be!

If you’d like to learn more about how we can help you smoothly transition into the cloud, then you can check out our Cloud Page.

Properly Sizing Azure for Your Organization

Posted on by Ben Tight

The Many Complexities of Azure Cloud Sizing

Moving to Microsoft’s Azure can be an exciting experience, with so many services including File Storage and Machine Learning Analytics, SQL Databases, and Data Transfer, to name just a few. With so many infrastructure options in one place, moving to the cloud is becoming the obvious option for IT departments. Correctly sizing Azure is a vital first step to maintaining your IT budget. It’s like getting a new pair of shoes; you don’t want to waddle around in clown shoes, but you also will need something that doesn’t pinch your toes.

Unfortunately, Azure is a large and complex system, meaning correctly sizing for your organization’s needs is no simple task. At MetrixData 360, we have provided our expert advice to many companies hoping to gain insights into how best to size their Azure environment. As a result, we have helped them maximize value from their Azure purchase. In this article, we’ll go through everything you need to think about when purchasing the right Azure size for you.

Different Azure Sizes for Your Virtual Machines

Microsoft has 11 different Azure Series available, from the entry-level A-Series to the far more robust N-Series. Within each series, there are also multiple sizes of virtual machines (VMs) available, pushing the number of offered virtual machine options into the hundreds. Some of these options types include:

  • General purpose (ideal for testing and development)
  • Compute Optimized (great high CPU-to-memory ratio, only available in Fsv2)
  • Memory Optimized
  • Storage optimized (only available in Lsv2)
  • GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) Optimized
  • High Performance Compute

Each option comes with a variety of different sizes and different pricing metrics. In such a complex environment, how are you supposed to know how to properly size your organization’s needs when moving to Azure?

That is where we come into the picture. We understand the complex nature of Azure and their licensing structure. With our custom-built tool set, we can accurately determine your sizing and computing needs, ensuring your IT department avoids over-licensing fees, costly true-ups, or being under-equipped. By collecting the most accurate data we can from your environment, our specialists are able to make well informed decisions regarding your needs. Microsoft has provided a basic Azure Pricing calculator of their own, though it is a convoluted tool to use.

Related: How Azure Compares to the Other Top Cloud Service Providers

Provisioning Virtual Machines

While finding the perfect Azure size is critical for your cost saving efforts, Microsoft’s unique way of calculating cost can make it difficult to size correctly, thanks to a little something Microsoft calls ‘provisioning’. Provisioning refers to a payment method where you pay based on a fixed capacity. This capacity could refer to memory capacity, bandwidth capacity or any other type of capacity. This capacity doesn’t reflect actual usage but instead is merely a fixed amount of space that you are paying for at any given moment, provisioning for less than you actually use could lead to your VMs struggling to cope with their tasks. This fixed capacity also doesn’t account for the changes in demand over a given year. However, it is more likely that you will pay for more than you use, which means you are wasting money on things you don’t use.

Related: Confused about Azure Sizing? Don’t Be!

Determining When to Puchase Reserved Instances

Strategic purchases of Microsoft’s Azure Reserved Instances (RI) can provide you with great discounts compared to the pay-as-you-go model – 36-47% cheaper for a one-year term; 60-72% cheaper if you sign up for a three year term; and potentially up to 80% cheaper if you combined it with the Hybrid Benefit. The fact that you can pay either a single upfront payment or monthly payments also offers a simpler solution when you are trying to budget your IT expenses. The process of purchasing your RI is as easy as selecting your Azure region, the virtual machine type, or how long you’d like your term to be (one year or three years) and you’re good to go. It is easy to exchange and cancel your reserved instances as you choose. However, it is important to note that a Reserved Instance is not an actual instance, it’s more like a coupon you can use when your instances are billed. Microsoft gets a guarantee in your business, and you get a discount. There are, however, still some drawbacks to purchasing reserved instances:

  • You’re locked in with the payment system once you’re signed up for it, and a lot of the costs, if not all of them, are upfront.
  • It’s not as easy to scale up or down compared to the Pay-as-You-Go system.

Thinking about your Move to Azure?

While significant changes to any department can cause a struggle, the same goes for the transition into Azure’s environment. Employees will have to be trained on managing the new platform and there needs to be management of both your on-prem and Azure assets. It may even be a smart idea to hire someone to look after your Azure platform.

At MetrixData 360, we provide our clients with the knowledge and the tools they need to manage their transition to the Azure’s platform successfully, which is why we have made a whole guidebook around the subject. If you would like to learn more about Azure, you can download our guide to Azure Licensing here.

IBM DB2 vs Oracle Database

Posted on by Ben Tight

With a constantly growing IT infrastructure, it is important to know how your company plans on managing data storage and data management. At MetrixData 360, our customers are taking an interest in IBM’s DB2 and Oracle’s Database, although there seems to be a bit of confusion about which one is right for their system. While we are unaffiliated to any software vendor, we aim to empower our customers to make smarter IT spending decisions for their business and so today, we’d like to go over what IBM DB2 and Oracle Database are and some things to consider before signing any contracts around either.

IBM DB2 Databases

IBM DB2 is a collection of relational database management systems (RDBMS). First commercially released in 1983, DB2 offers its clients a means to manage their structured and unstructured data that is stored both on-prem and in the Cloud. These hybrid data management products are powered by AI capabilities to create an efficient means of providing data insights while being both flexible and scalable. It is one of the three most popular databases available in the market today, alongside Microsoft SQL Servers and Oracle’s Database.

Features of DB2

The reviews for this product rank it highly for its ability to work with substantial amounts of data without reducing its performance by any means. Clients also report receiving very little downtime from the product. IBM’s DB2 is praised for its stability, customers reporting that both its hardware and software have proven reliable. DB2 is also proven to have excellent storage capabilities, and claims to be especially SQL server compatible, so if you have experience with similar products, you won’t be starting from square one.

Disadvantages of DB2

Reviews on Gartner from IBM’s clients reveal that the setup of DB2 can be quite laborious and there is a risk that queries would produce the wrong results if the DB2 fails to interact correctly with other products. There is also a learning curve to be found with DB2 and it requires a skilled team for the product to reach its full potential. The tools for queries have also been reported to be a bit lacking.

What is the Future of DB2

In June of 2019, IBM released DB2 11.5, which is praised for its AI capabilities. This new database is powered by and run by AI. The benefits of this can be found in the database’s high-speed queries, and its ability to handle natural language querying, which are styled after search engines and can provide a similar user experience.

Can IBM DB2 be Taken to the Cloud?

IBM does offer a Cloud solution, IBM DB2 on Cloud, which presents tempting features like quick and easy installation, compatibility with Oracle’s database, and even a free tier available if you’d like to try it out – though we always advise caution around free software and exposure to shadow IT. Although reviews have claimed that it lacks the regional options of larger Cloud platforms, so it is always best to check the availability of IBM Cloud capabilities in your particular region, as it could easily influence its overall performance and your user experience.

Oracle Database

Another popular option that many businesses are opting into is the highly reputable Oracle Database. Oracle Database appeared in 1979 with Oracle v2 being marked as the first commercially available SQL-based RDBMS.

Features of Oracle Database

Oracle comes with many wonderful features, such as their high quality support, scalability, and the ability to track sophisticated architecture. It has also been reported to be extremely reliable, with very little down time and applying new instances to Oracle can be relatively painless.

Disadvantages of Oracle Database

Some of the disadvantages of having Oracle as your database is, according to reviews on Gartner, that the system needs an experienced administrator at the helm in order to properly manage it. The product is also very expensive, with the tool proving out of reach for most start-up businesses on a budget.

The Future of Oracle Database

Oracle has been tentatively looking into things like having algorithms embedded directly into microprocessors and integrating big data storage with the data their customers have already accumulated when installing Oracle Database. Oracle’s database also wishes to make its product able to more easily integrate with other products like SQL Server and JSON.

Can Oracle Database be Taken to the Cloud?

Oracle can be taken to the Cloud thanks to Oracle Cloud for Database Management, which offers a variety of features including the ability to easily implement it, easily creating backups and restore processes and easy patching. One of the main appeals of Oracle Database, according to Oracle’s own website, can be found in in the fact that you can move to the Cloud seamlessly, using the same technology that you had on-prem and claiming to have zero downtime during the transition (although reviews have tracked the installation time to anywhere between 2.5-3.5 hours). The product has also been praised in Gartner Reviews for being able to handle a large workload (one review even claims to run a million daily transactions through Oracle). Although, more critical reviews have said that the auto-extend data storage needs to be improved, and the DB monitor alerts are not exactly effective.

Which Works Best for You?

At MetrixData 360, we want you to make as an informed decision as possible about your next purchase with IBM or Oracle as both have reputations of frequently auditing their customers’ compliance with their difficult to read contracts. It is important that you get a fair deal that best suits your business’s unique software profile. At MetrixData 360, we have saved our clients millions of dollars through successful contract negotiations with IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, and Adobe, just to list a few of the vendors that we have handled in the past. Get the Software Contract Negotiation Experts on your team and save big on your next software contract.

About Virtual Machines

Posted on by Ben Tight

An Overview on Virtual Machines

Virtual Machines can bring increased mobility and productivity to your business, but before you start filling your screen up with VMs, it is important to first have a strong understanding of what they are and how you can license them. At MetrixData 360, we have worked alongside plenty of organizations looking to maximize the efficiency of their software environment, including the use of their VMs. So today we’ll get into a few of your most pressing questions surrounding virtual machines.

What is a Virtual Machine (VM)?

Just to quickly summarize, a virtual machine (VM) is a virtual environment that behaves separately from the rest of your software environment. It is basically a computer that runs inside another computer, appearing as a window on your screen. It can drastically reduce the time that is required to bring a new server online, going from weeks or months to mere minutes or hours. By booting an operating installer disc (either a virtual or physical one) inside the VM, it is tricked into thinking it is running on a real computer. The actual operating system on your device is called the Host operating system and the operating systems on the VMs are called Guests. Just to keep things from getting too confusing, here is a guide to some terminology from VM Ware.

VMs come with many advantages:

  • They allow you to safely try out new applications or data that you know is infected with a virus without having them mingle with the rest of your software environment through the use of sandboxing.
  • They allow you to use different operating systems and run applications your main operating system wouldn’t be able to support.
  • They are easy to remove from your operating system once you are finished.

The downside of VMs is that the virtualization process has the tendency to add some lag to the programs you are attempting to run, especially if that program requires copious amounts of storage.

You can run multiple VMs at the same time, with the only limitation being how much storage your hard drive has.

VM Sprawl

The main appeal to virtual machines is how fast they are to bring online and the lack of governance that usually surrounds physical servers within an organization. However, with this agility comes the main concern with VMs: letting them run away from you. This is true for anything that is easy and fast to make, whether that is emails, files, or databases, all of which suffer from sprawl issues. VM sprawl occurs when your company loses track of how many VMs are connected to your software environment. It remains one of the biggest concerns organizations face when it comes to virtual machines. When employees can spin up as many VMs as they like, your company runs the risk of having more than your network can support or than your licenses allow you to have.

There are a few ways one can deal with VM sprawl. You can get a reporting tool to monitor your software environment, however, this only addresses part of the issue, since reporting tools will only give you visibility into the problem. You can track whether it is getting better or worse but there may be very little indication of where the problem is coming from. It is also important to have policies and governance in place that will allow for the cleanup of unused VMs and make it possible to recycle them back into your environment.

Licensing Virtual Machines

Virtual machines are essentially devices that have been built and simply exist on another device. So, in case you were wondering, you absolutely need a license for them. How those VMs are licensed is the real tricky part. Some of the features that can create challenges around licensing VM include:

  • High Mobility: You can potentially move an entire virtualized operating system from one host to another.
  • Near-complete Isolation is Needed: If you want to create portability of your VMs guest files, you’ll need it to be near totally isolated, with the main exception being CPU/processor models.
  • Snapshots of a Machine State: Being able to take snapshots allows for the possibility to revert back to a previous state quickly and to repeatedly reinstall a trial to gain additional usage.
  • Advanced CPU Compatibility Masking: this allows for per-virtual machine customization.

As you can see, trying to license VMs can be challenging, especially with the minimal fingerprint a VM leaves on its host device and the quick and easy ability to clone a VM. If you license a device to a piece of software, potentially countless VMs could access that software.

The specific rules revolving around licenses differ from vendor to vendor and licensing type to licensing type.

For IBM, for instance, a VM needs to be licensed for any software that it comes into contact with, and it must be licensed as though it were a regular device. You can find more details about the matter in our article.

For Microsoft, licenses that are eligible for license mobility through software can be moved to an Azure environment with default per-minute cost. Windows Server licenses are not eligible for license mobility but if you have Software Assurance, you can utilize the Azure Hybrid Benefits in order to access cheaper per-minute costs.

If you can’t already tell, this can become quite confusing very quickly.

There are general rules you can use to minimize your risk of running up against compliance issues.

  • Detection and prevention tactics
  • Utilize Network Floating Licenses, which will allow you to track the number of concurrent users using the software, which will force VMs to communicate with a central licensing server.
  • Periodic license validation, this will allow for a central server communication and the transfer and revocation of licenses.
  • License a special build if you can’t avoid running virtual machines. This will allow you run virtual machines, although it will be set at a higher price point in order to counter the costs of anticipated VM cloning.

Working from Home? Make Sure Your Licensing Allows It!

Still Have Questions?

Virtual Machines can make our lives so much easier and make our work so much more productive, so long as we properly understand them and know how to license them. The last thing you need right now is being forced to either prove which nearly invisible virtual machine did what or simply take the brunt the full blow of an audit penalty, especially when you’re pretty sure you don’t owe as much as the auditors are saying you do. At MetrixData 360, we have helped companies clean up the messiest software environments by getting them started on software asset management and taught them to keep even the most untraceable software in line. Learn more about how you can get started with software asset management.

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