There is significant growing concern among large enterprises of the increased risks related to ownership and use of software licenses. To combat this threat, businesses deploy Software Asset Management practices and tools to manage the acquisition, purchase and utilization of software assets.
One of the recent trends is software manufactures are driving software compliance audits as a way to allow for upselling. Unfortunately, most CIOs don’t pay much attention to compliance issues until it’s too late. It’s estimated that as much as 37 percent of the software installed on computers used in business operations is unlicensed, which creates a level of risk that should be unacceptable due to the strong connection between the use of unlicensed software and malware infections. Malware from unlicensed software costs companies worldwide nearly $359 billion a year.
Inadvertent use of unlicensed software not only puts your company at risk of security breaches that result in serious reductions in levels of consumer confidence, they could end up costing you your job as well as have the potential to create sticky legal difficulties. In fact, software licensing disputes are currently on the rise due to new technologies being put into place that conflict with existing software contracts.
Following are things you can do to maintain a good software license position and minimize risks of security breaches created by unlicensed software.
- Create a Secured Contract Repository
Establishing a comprehensive record of the user accounts, software presence and usage on your own computers and devices, in addition cloud deployments to promote awareness of possible licensing conflicts and lets you take steps to resolve issues before they occur.
- Control Misuse of Software
Educate employees on the importance of maintaining compliance concerning software use terms and conditions and have them sign off as confirmation that they’ve been made aware of all applicable policies.
- Implement Software Management Tools
Studies show that organizations can achieve as much as 30 percent savings in annual software costs by implementing a robust SAM and software license optimization program. The majority of the tools available on the market address contracts, financial management, license management, and inventory database. The cutting-edge capabilities are license optimization, planning and intelligent discovery.
Major Key Players:
Some of the key players of software asset management market include Aspera Technologies (US), BMC Software (US), CA Technologies (US), Microsoft (US), Symantec (US), Certero (UK), Cherwell Software (US), Flexera (US), IBM (US), Ivanti (US),Micro Focus (UK), Scalable Software (US), ServiceNow (US), CloudFabrix Software Inc.(U.S) and Snow Software (Sweden)
Audits are an essential tool in effective software management. Fortunately, there are several top-quality software audit tools available for use for free, including the following:
- Absolute Computrance — this cloud-based console features an internal Software License Compliance report that provides clients with an ongoing audit of all existing software.
- Cherwell Asset Management — Cherwell offers an award-winning asset management tool with optimal visibility of software assets that easily determines the licensing status all software applications installed on your computer.
- Lansweeper Computer Inventory — Lansweeper brings internal compliance calculators and 200 built-in reports to the table.
Please feel free to contact one of our representatives for personalized advice on software asset management.