What is Software License Optimization? The short answer is: Software License Optimization is the ongoing process of proactively managing the software estate, throughout the software product lifecycle, to maximize utilization of assets, minimize costs and maintain license compliance. It requires reconciling software installations (inventory data) with what the organization has purchased—license entitlements, taking into account the vendor’s product use rights that determine how the software can be installed and/or used.

It’s important to remember that software purchases don’t provide ‘ownership’, but merely the right to use the software under the terms of the license agreement. Software License Optimization extends beyond traditional software asset management (SAM) to incorporate strategies, and the tools to support them, to fully leverage these license entitlements—software product use rights. This allows the enterprise to minimize license consumption, calculate an optimized license position and reduce ongoing costs.

Software License Optimization also encompasses other strategies to optimize licensing, such as tracking and analyzing usage data to determine the optimal named user license type for each user and finding unused software for reallocation to other users. Different strategies are required depending on the vendor’s license model and the use rights that go with it.

SOURCE: corporatecomplianceinsights.com