Proactive SAM is the perfect antidote to cloud blackmail

Best practice

Proactive SAM is the perfect antidote to cloud blackmail

14 March 2016

2 minute read

In this podcast I was joined by Eric, Richard and Nico to discuss the software market ahead of our audit defence workshop in Amsterdam on the 12th April. Further info here.

Podcast Guests

Left to Right (Richard, Nico, Eric and Martin)

Cloud Blackmail and other Dirty Tricks

Proactive SAM, the perfect antidote for cloud blackmail and aggressive audit behaviour

IBM audit – similar levels of audits but starting to tackle smaller companies, for thorough – looking to squeeze every penny from an audit.
Oracle – Audits are still a cash cow, but now audits are also being used to create momentum to sell cloud. Dirty tricks around VMware continue.
Oracle sales reps are being compensated 5-7 sales commission multiples for selling cloud. Customers move to cloud just to get rid of the Oracle sales rep.
Register article on Oracle and VMware
Customers feel blackmailed by audits. Take Office365 or Oracle Cloud to take away the audit pain
Take control manage software risk to prevent being blackmailed. Software Asset Management is the answer! What’s worse than being blackmailed to order something you don’t want, is to be blackmailed for something you won’t use
Use cloud sales incentives for your advantage (Buy a piece of cloud as part of a larger transaction to take advantage of larger discounts and sales incentives).
License assignment rights in the contract in the event of M&A activity
Support and maintenance on second hand licensing. Transferring licenses when Oracle is not involved.
Vague responses from SAP on license metrics. Put it in your agreement! Send letter to legal counsel of vendor for written confirmation of metrics.
Most IBM overages are the results of misconfiguration rather than over usage. Learn what you can fix before the audits visits.