Imagine for a moment you are an end customer who wants to move workloads to the cloud. You have an Enterprise Agreement (EA) that is getting ready to expire (you continue to renew because that is what you are accustomed to). Your finance team is pressuring all departments because of the current economic environment. What are your options?
- You can leverage AWS to host your infrastructure. What licenses can you transfer over? You purchased Windows Server licenses with Software Assurance (SA). I'll bring those over. Sorry, AWS is a Listed Provider. No Windows SA benefit for you. What happens if I decide to use a non Listed Provider? What is a Listed Provider? You are an end customer, not a hoster. You are careless about who is a Listed Provider and who is not.
- Since you are an end customer, you ask your hoster (Non-Listed Provider) if you can purchase CSP licenses from their agreement and have them host them for you. Unfortunately, the hoster (at this time) would have to be CSP Direct authorized. What is CSP Direct? After all, you are an EA customer.
- Your hoster mentions you can buy SPLA from them and not worry about the licensing. Great, you say, but what in the world is SPLA? A new coronavirus?
As you can see, an end customer has A LOT of options and A LOT of questions. It is REALLY important for you (now a hoster) to understand these options and how to educate best and coach your clients through the treacherous waters called Microsoft licensing.
It is NOT just about compliance, and it is about profitability. If you have a question about licensing or maybe you want some best practices, I encourage you to check out our YouTube channel and sign up for our latest webinar every month first Thursday highlighted below:
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Thanks for reading,
SPLA Man