Software Asset Management (SAM) Blog

Microsoft have just released data from their last financial year (July 2006 - June 2007) in relation to the audits they undertook and the amount of counterfeit software discovered in those customers.

29% of UK corporate-sized customers that went through a Software Asset Management review(audit) were found to have high quality counterfeit in their organisations This fake software had an equivalent value of $6.5m. In fact, the average value of counterfeit bought by each customer was $75K (based on a Volume Licensing legalisation value), or $105K based on the actual OEM/FPP value.

Microsoft in the UK has pioneered a highly effective process for identifying counterfeit software. Known as ‘Proof of Licence’, . Pilot programmes based on this approach are being proposed and developed for the US, Canada, France, Germany, Holland, India and Australia.

To find out more about piracy and how to advice customers the Microsoft Partner Portal at https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/40029354

Further evidence of The Business Software Alliance stepping up its’ activities to pursue customes using unlicensed software. More reasons to adopt Software Asset Management. 

Business Software Alliance Settles with AccentCare, Inc., Global Microwave Systems, Inc. and Investors Management Trust Real Estate Group, Inc.Three California-based companies have recently settled for more than $700,000 with the Business Software Alliance (BSA) for unlicensed software use. AccentCare, Inc. of Irvine paid over $240,400; Investors Management Trust Real Estate Group, Inc., of Sherman Oaks, paid $235,000; and Global Microwave Systems, Inc. (GMS), of

An unnamed UK company has agreed to pay a record fine of £250,000  for running unlicensed software.

The company (which operates in the infrastructure and public services sector) was running unlicensed copies of Adobe, Autodesk, and Microsoft software on hundreds of PCs across several UK locations.

The BSA is highly active and is said to be investigating a number of large UK companies who are believe to be running un-licensed Software.

The BSA is not the only organsiation actively auditing customers. A recent Gartner study showed that major software vendors such as Adobe, IBM, BEA Systems, Microsoft, Oracle and Attachmate are aggressively auditing customers where they believe there is unlicensed copies of their software in use.

Companies should be protecting themselves against such activity but how?

By implementing good Software Asset Management processes to adequately manage an organisation’s software assets. This will involve technology, people and processes.

Deploy an autodiscovery/inventory such as Centennial Discovery so the organisation has an understanding of what assets are deployed across the organisation. Combine this with licence management technology such as Centennial License Manager 2.0 which will launch September 2007 and the organisation will be on the road to gaining control of their software assets.

Implement good SAM processes such as those recommended in ITIL guide to Software Asset mangement. http://www.best-management-practice.com/ or in the ISO/IEC 19770-1 Standard for Software Asset Management and the organisation should avoid the risk of a vendor audit and associated.

If an audit is requested by a vendor these processes should make it a relatively straightforward process as it will be easy to demonstrate what the compliance position is and the organisation will be on the front foot of any negotiations with vendors.