The excitement that ensues as a Microsoft True-Up approaches is unparalleled—said no IT professional ever. It happens every year, yet it is sometimes dreaded as much as filling out your taxes. This is because, year after year, the mission is so similar. The sole purpose of your True-Up is to reconcile what has happened over the past year, make your best prediction of what will happen in the coming year, and do everything you can to avoid an audit.
For your organization, it might be a question of SQL licensing. Maybe you’re considering a move to Modern Work. Or perhaps you’ve completed a divestiture—or made an acquisition—and the records are a bit of a mess. Couple that with the complexities of Microsoft licensing rules and it can get overwhelming very easily. But what if I told you Connection offers an Asset Discovery and Optimization (ADO) Assessment aimed specifically at customers approaching their True-Up that offers full visibility into the assets deployed on your network? Interested? Of course, you are!
How It Works
We start the engagement by gaining full visibility into the assets deployed on your network. This includes servers, workstations, mobile devices, and the software used across their endpoints. Connection is partnered with Block64 to provide a low-impact, agentless discovery tool that is fast and easy to deploy. The entire configuration only takes 30 minutes.
Once deployed, your asset inventory is encrypted and securely transferred to a regionally located Tier 4 data center. It is then cleansed, categorized, matched, analyzed for advanced reporting—including installed software categorization, license assignment, hardware warranty matching, and end-of-support / end-of-life status—and cross-referenced with all known security vulnerabilities.*
You might need some of this, or even all of this, which is why the ADO engagement is broken down into three service levels:
Standard
- Ensure your on-premises and hybrid cloud server environment is ready to meet evolving business demands. Get actionable insights into server capacity, utilization, and licensing to shrink your data center footprint, improve workload performance, and reduce costs.
- Server Optimization Assessment: Connection will review your legacy Windows and SQL Server licensing for supportability, identify over- and under-utilized hardware, look for ways to reduce your server footprint, and look for savings opportunities using your Azure Hybrid Benefit and reserved instances.
- Azure Virtual Desktop: An overview of existing virtual and physical client infrastructure that provides recommendations for optimization.
- Modern Work; We can help you assess the unique requirements of your business and users to create a roadmap for workplace transformation that leverages the latest Office 365 productivity and collaboration technologies with a licensing solution that fits your budget.
Premium
- Standard benefits plus Microsoft Software License Compliance
- 90-Day license key for the use of Block 64 inventory tool
- Normalization of all active licenses and subscriptions
- Azure Hybrid Benefit licensing review
- Consultant-led license compliance validation
Premium Plus
Premium benefits plus Effective License Position (ELP) to help you reconcile your license entitlements against the deployed estate.
At the end of the ADO engagement, your Connection Account Team delivers reporting and analytics to help you leverage what you have, orphan what you no longer need, and advise you on what you might find useful. This makes the Microsoft True-Up experience less like doing taxes and more of an eye-opening opportunity to propel your organization feet first into a year of innovation.
Ready to learn more? Reach out to your Connection Account Team today or watch our vlog.
*From: Block 64 Discovery and Analytics Platform
Lesley Thomas
Lesley Thomas joined Connection’s XLO Team in January 2023. She brings extensive knowledge on managed services pricing, operations, and financial analysis. In her spare time, she enjoys entertaining family and friends, woodworking, Mario Kart, and organizing.
