Microsoft licensing is a complicated business, so it’s only right that we reach for a metaphor to explain it. Nick Riley, head of cloud solutions at Dundee-headquartered Brightsolid, glances at his spreadsheet to run the numbers: according to his calculation, there are 541 Microsoft licences currently available to consumers of the tech giant’s Office product range.
And unless you’re an expert in how to use them, many consumers – especially large corporate customers who pay per user – will quickly run into challenges.
“It’s a bit like when you go online to look for an all-inclusive holiday,” says Riley, who speaks to me on a Teams call from his home in Staffordshire.
“You expect to pay a bit more so you can relax and enjoy yourself and not worry about any add-ons. You can sort of do the same by buying a Microsoft ‘bundle’ when it comes to licences. However, it’s not so straightforward.”
Riley explains that it’s now all-too-common for customers to come in at an entry level, with a small number of Microsoft licences. But as they grow, and add more functionality and capability to their organisations, they accumulate many “bolt-on” products and services, reaching the point where they have effectively paid more than a bundle price.
“Unless you manage it in a controlled way, it can become quite unwieldy,” says Riley, whose past experience includes managing the cloud infrastructure for retailer New Look.
It’s why Brightsolid has decided to launch a new campaign which offers a range of specialised cloud and hybrid solutions which will help existing and hopefully new customers to get a better handle on their IT estates.
This will potentially help to save many thousands of pounds in unused or superfluous licences but also, crucially, adding value to the way their licences are currently configured.
Riley explains: “We obviously can’t guarantee it, but the expectation is that by looking at the way customers are using their licences, we could drive savings of between 10 and 15 per cent.
“During a time when budgets are under constant pressure, that’s a not insignificant sum for many organisations. At the very least, we should be able to prevent customers from paying for components they’re not using.”
Another reason why IT or cloud managers should go down this path is managing compliance.
“When you buy one licence for some of Microsoft’s security tools, it then allows you to use those security tools for everybody, even without having licences covering them,” adds Riley. “So, if you don’t then configure the security tools just to target the licensed user you’ve suddenly got quite a big non-compliance risk.”
Riley leans into his argument. “We have a case study of a customer which Microsoft had identified as having bought 10 licences, but they were covering over 1,000 users. That’s a huge additional cost for them if left unattended.
“For some things the licence self-regulates, so for Office you can’t deploy more copies than you have licences for. But for some of the security tools, like Microsoft Defender, you can. So, you can buy one and use it for everybody, but you’re actually breaking the licensing terms. And unless you address it, you’ll eventually get that knock on the door.”
Microsoft Entra is another product line, which Riley sees as needing consolidation. Entra, formerly Azure Active Directory, is now the security perimeter for many organisations.
“Whereas 10 to 15 years ago, we would talk about perimeter firewalls and network firewalls doing this work, now it’s all about digital identity. The first thing is everybody’s got Entra, it’s the username and password as part of your Office account,” says Riley.
Riley goes on to explain that at the basic level Microsoft Entra licence covers username and password, but there’s a whole suite of security tools that sits behind it. Navigating those licences, and configuring them, is therefore essential to good IT estate management.
“And you can extend them out to Salesforce and all your SaaS apps, so it’s really important to get right, because you can end up paying through the nose,” Riley, pictured below, adds. “In addition to identifying those savings, we can really help customers leverage the right capabilities.”
All of these things make you wonder why you can’t just ring Microsoft up and ask them to help. But that’s not straightforward either. Even relatively large companies struggle to get direct access to an account manager.
The tech giant – the third biggest company in the world by market capitalisation, valued at $3 trillion – is simply unable to account manage each and every customer it has worldwide. Microsoft Teams alone has 320 million daily users, according to Statista, just as an illustration of the challenge.
“Microsoft recognise the need for experienced partners to support organisations,” says Riley. “That is part of their strategy, and in some ways that is reflected in the discount and incentives they give us to work with organisations on this. They’ll only deal with you directly under certain circumstances.”
The campaign launch is, to an extent, a reflection of how Brightsolid works with customers, which include private and public sector organisations, more generally.
Riley says he likes to be able to get into the nitty gritty of a customer’s security and cloud posture, and work out how to add tangible value.
He recalls an instance where he was able to identify a large company’s use of outdated versions of Office, closing a potentially looming security threat. Managed Detection and Response (MDR) is a growing part of the business for Brightsolid, driven by many customers’ legitimate fears over ransomware and cyber attacks.
“It’s pretty easy to spot where some of those security gaps are,” adds Riley. “I don’t think there’s a single customer where we haven’t been able to improve something for them.
“So, where you have companies with IT administrators and maybe those high-risk staff with enhanced access, we’ve done lunch and learn sessions with them to really consolidate what they’re doing, giving them the tools to improve their own security postures, and therefore protecting the wider estate.
“But not only that, we’re quite happy to teach those IT administrators how to configure those settings for themselves. We’ll often do that as part of our adoption of a new MDR customer, if we’re onboarding somebody, we’ll work with them to enhance their security posture.
“That’s the other reason Microsoft partners to deliver in this space, because we can go that extra mile. Customers are not just buying a licence, they’re being helped to configure it in the right way.”
The message Riley wants to leave with people considering responding to the Brightsolid campaign is simple.
“Are you confident you’re getting the value out of your Microsoft licences?
“One thing to consider is flexibility. Because we can price things monthly, it gives us scope to be a bit more competitive.
“If you’ve got a thousand users and transact directly with Microsoft, they’ll still want a partner involved, but one of the challenges around that is that you’ll normally have to commit to three years as a minimum volume.
“So the message is ‘when did you last do a strategic review of your IT estate’?” he says.
To find out more contact Brightsolid on 01382 429 000 or visit brightsolid.com
Partner Content in association with Brightsolid