Security and data concerns hinder Microsoft Cloud adoption – London Seminar Review
Thursday 17th September 2015 saw the ITAM Review return to London for the last in the series of our popular data centre licensing events, this time focusing on the prolific vendor that is Microsoft.
50 end users attended the full day event in Tavistock Square, and the day began with registration, refreshments and an introduction to our event sponsors; Aspera, Flexera Software, Snow Software, Belarc and Concorde Solutions.
Delegates arrive at the London Microsoft Licensing Seminar
Presentations
After ITAM Review’s Martin Thompson welcomed the delegates, Steve Warbrick from Platinum Sponsors Aspera presented the first plenary session: ‘How to optimize licensing for Windows server and SQL for virtual environments’.
Duncan Jones from Forrester Research
The second presentation came from Duncan Jones of Forrester Research Limited: ‘Rethink Your Microsoft Licensing Strategy’, followed by ‘Microsoft License Healthcheck’ from Piaras MacDonnell from Suredatum. Simona Millham from Licensing School presented the last plenary session, ‘How to Avoid The Top 10 Microsoft Licensing Gotchas’.
You can view the plenary presentation slides by clicking here. Please email Duncan Jones if you would like access to the presentation from Forrester Research.
Interactive Workshops
After a hearty lunch, delegates reconvened for the interactive workshops.
Expert speaker Duncan Jones facilitated the first workshop, with support from our panel consisting of licensing specialists from sponsors Snow Software, Flexera Software and Concorde Solutions. Delegates were split into teams and asked to explore collaborating with partners using Microsoft technology. For example how to build solutions for sharing documents with external third parties a customers using SharePoint, when to buy licenses and when to use SPLA.
Workshop 1 underway
Workshop 2 was facilitated by Rich Gibbons from Licensing School, again supported by the panel and by using a case study, he discussed the challenges of managing a hybrid licensing environment.
Delegates found the interactive workshops particularly useful as it allowed them to interact with their peers and put their licensing knowledge to work. Throughout the workshops, the teams were awarded points and the winning team was congratulated with applause!
The winning workshop team!
Key Concerns Raised by Delegates
The following key issues were raised by delegates during the day:
- Office 365 Licensing and product options
- Building deals with Microsoft and pitfalls to avoid
- Cloud security
- Software Assurance – worth it? When?
- SQL Licensing and Software Assurance
- The frequency of change for SQL license terms
- Global EA renewals and challenges
- Windows 10, Software Assurance and Futures
- User based model and transitioning from device
- General understanding of Microsoft Licensing – beginners
- Migrating from perpetual to subscription whilst retaining some value from your existing investments
Key Takeaways
As per the event video – a big area of concern for our event attendees is cloud basics that Microsoft still appears not to have quashed (or communicated effectively with their customers). This includes things like data sovereignty, data security, cloud exit strategies were noted as blockers to hybrid adoption with more frequency that licensing issues.
Feedback
We had some great feedback both on the day and after the event:
Great discussion about some external collaboration scenarios. Proved how complex #microsoft rules are for such use.
https://t.co/Uo8Ys1aPQc— Duncan Jones (@duncanwjones) September 17, 2015
Excellent day today. Insightful from all presenters and delegates https://t.co/k6LOe4eJyD
— David Coburn (@coburnda) September 17, 2015
thanks to everyone @itamreview for a great day, knowledge overload #ITAMREvents #itamtips
— Matt Smith (@WelshBlackLab) September 17, 2015
Thank you
A big thank you to our event sponsors, speakers and delegates for being part of the event. We look forward to seeing you all again soon! For details of our next upcoming events click here.
Platinum Sponsor
Gold Sponsors
Join us for more of the same in New York!
We’re back in New York on 21st October to deliver our free Microsoft Licensing Seminar to our US readers.
To register or find out more, click here, we’d love to see you there!
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