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2Maintaining a Consistent License Monitoring Policy Is Essential
3Gather Detailed Information
Collect complete, detailed information. Large applications are often deployed across multiple platforms and include a wide range of options, entitlements and utilities. Only detailed information provides sufficient visibility into the complete deployment and provides the accurate information negotiators need.
4Automation Is Good
5Maintain Control by Assessing Change
6Virtualization Changes the Picture
Many vendor virtualization policies are independent of the software agreement and can change without notice. When negotiating or renegotiating software licenses, enterprises should require software vendors to explicitly spell out their virtualization policies within the contracts to protect themselves against future costs. If this is not possible then the most effective way to ensure compliance is not to virtualize systems where licensing rules remain ambiguous.
7Check Cost Implications of Virtualization
8Understand Usage Rights
9Distribute Licensing Costs
10Use a Central Repository for Multiple Contracts
11Licensing Optimization Becomes a Trend
The SAM market is rapidly evolving. It is no longer sufficient to just count what you have; you need to be able to optimize your software assets. Enterprises should implement enterprise license optimization strategies that ultimately provide continuous license reconciliation between what was purchased and what was installed and used in both physical as well as virtual environments, across the desktop and data center.