The SPLA Program is quite different from a traditional Perpetual or Subscription agreement, mainly because there are no acquired or fixed number of entitlements, setting limitations on usage.
Therefore, it is not the history of acquired license entitlements in relation to the number of installations, but the current need for licenses in a complex and ever-changing environment that is important.
A traditional SAM tool is built to keep track of the balance between acquired entitlements and usage, typically for the contractual period and beyond.
SPLA compliance is about ordering licenses based on the actual license need per reporting month.
An inventory tool will give you the actual numbers on installation/access which is the foundation for calculating your licensing needs, but it does not assist you in keeping track of the rules and requirements from the SPLA agreement(s) or SPUR documents, especially the use rights which may change through your SPLA agreement period – or across several agreements, if you have more than one.
At the end of the day what you need for running an SPLA business is support for the full process, including compliance documentation for Inventory, License calculations and what you have ordered to give the full overview.
SPLA Manager is tailor-made for the sole purpose of doing this – and nothing else.
For more information, request a free demo.
A tool for managing SPLA could, for many, be a traditional SAM tool, still a SPLA tool has as many differences as there are similarities.
To mention some of the differences these are:
So when we started out on creating a tool for SPLA management, these were just some of the things we took into consideration.
The purpose of LicenseWatch SPLA Manager was to build a SPLA tool, which could cover the full SPLA process, from inventory, through License Calculation and Ordering to Archiving for Compliance reasons.
In the early process of designing this we discovered that trying to make our traditional SAM tool do this would not satisfy our ambitions.
Hence we started over again, this time from the top down, and interviewed a handful of Service Providers about what was in particularly relevant for them.
Based on this we boiled it down to the following list:
If you share these wishes for a SPLA tool or would like to add topics, please contact us. If you want to learn more, fell free sign up for one of our webinars.
SPLA Reporting Made Accurate & Automated