Microsoft tool gives customers license advice

In a continuing effort to help customers navigate its labyrinth of products and software licenses, Microsoft Corp. this week rolled out a new online tool to help customers with volume discount licenses choose products.

The new tool, called the Microsoft Product Licensing Advisor, (http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/mplahome.mspx) will be rolled out in three phases, said Sunny Jensen Charlebois, senior product manager of worldwide licensing and pricing.

The first phase, online now, provides a comparison of Microsoft’s volume licensing programs, walks a customer through the process of choosing licenses for products and gives customers a snapshot of the products and licenses they may need to run their business, she said.

“The first step is to empower customers to get an understanding of what products they will need and what licenses they’ll need,” Charlebois said.

Microsoft sells its volume licenses mainly through partners, so once customers get an idea of what they will need by using the tool, they can contact a Microsoft partner to help them make final decisions on licenses and products, she said.

The second phase of the tool’s rollout, expected to occur in January, will provide more detailed advice about products as well as information on client access licenses and the dependencies between different products, Charlebois said.

The third and final phase of the tool’s rollout, expected sometime between March and June 2006, will enable customers to directly connect with partners via a chat client, and also provide a licensing quote for specific product sets that cater to a business need, she said. For example, a customer can find out the best product set and the licenses a company will need to purchase a company-wide business intelligence application, Charlebois said.

For nearly two years, Microsoft has been introducing new ways to simplify its licensing models. The changes are based on feedback from customers and partners who say it is extremely challenging to find cost-effective and efficient ways of purchasing licenses for a seemingly endless list of Microsoft products.

“The big deal has been the explosion of part numbers [because] Microsoft’s product line has grown tremendously over the last several years,” said Steve Acterman, director, corporate IT management at VOLT Information Sciences Inc., a Microsoft customer who helped the company develop the new tool. “And for every product you can buy, there are a number of options: license only, Software Assurance, license plus Software Assurance, standard version, professional version, enterprise version. It’s become unmanageable and almost beyond the user’s comprehension [to order products].”

Charlebois said Microsoft’s primary goal with the new tool is to ease the pain of navigating its myriad products and licenses. “We’re trying to find a way to make it easier for both our customers and our partners to do business with us,” she said.

The Product Licensing Advisor should be “tremendously helpful” for both customers and partners licensing Microsoft products, Acterman said.

REFERENCES: Microsoft simplifies financing, licensing, Jul. 9, 2005