The Importance of Licensing

As a trusted advisor to your customers, you need a wealth of information to help them understand and maximize the value of their software investments.

We understand the unique challenges and considerations ISVs face. You must manage intense competition, constantly changing technology, and customers who demand more out of their ISV by providing extensible software solutions that scale with their businesses. You can build confidence—and long-lasting relationships—with customers when you can skillfully advise them about their licensing choices.

At Microsoft, we know that licensing can be perceived as overly complex. Our goal is to make it easier to understand—and to communicate the importance and value that licensing has for ISVs and their customers. Licensing, of course, is the lifeblood of the software industry. It is how software companies—yours as well as Microsoft—protect intellectual property, give customers a means to plan and monitor their software purchases, and obtain compensation for the hard work and skill that has gone into developing software code.

So what is Microsoft Licensing?

There are various programs that benefit the business and development goals of ISVs. In simple terms, a software license from Microsoft gives organizations and individuals the legal right to install, use, access, display, run, or otherwise interact with a software product. A license agreement defines the way in which the licensed product can be used. Click here to learn more about the various licensing programs Microsoft offers.

The Benefits for You

Microsoft Licensing Programs combine the best of two companies’ offerings: yours and ours. There are programs designed specifically to meet your business and technology goals, including the ISV Royalty Licensing Program and Services Provider Licensing Agreement, which can help boost your profits and extend solution life cycles. By taking a closer and strategic look at Microsoft Licensing, you will find that it helps reduce application development costs, enable fast delivery and installation of applications, and ease ongoing software management and quality assurance.

There’s another critical benefit. In most cases, you will be deploying software solutions that will scale through every phase of their development, which means there may be several licensing routes to achieving their IT and wider corporate objectives. ISVs should be prepared by understanding how to best plug in when faced with needing to blend into existing licensing scenarios.

You can gain a considerable advantage when you can advise customers on their software licensing options. Not only are you helping to better position your software offering, but your are giving customers the knowledge to make informed business decisions. When total cost of ownership is reduced and your customers can save on their software licenses, they have more room in their IT budgets—including deployments and services that can be provided by you.

The Benefits for Your Customers

Your customers are counting on you to deliver scalable software solutions that grow with their businesses. Along with that, they want to know the right licensing options that can protect their software investments. When your customers understand the basics of licensing, as well as your role in reducing the resources required for license maintenance, they’re better equipped to talk with you about how a license can influence the use of their software solutions. By transferring an understanding of their license options, customers have a better handle on their IT spend and can be proactive with you in planning for upgrades and maintenance.