Licensing for engineering software can be node-locked, named-user, or floating (also called concurrent-use).
Floating is most popular because licenses can be shared. However, the Vendor puts a restriction on how much sharing can occur.
Floating licenses can be WAN (wide area network) or LAN (local area network). WAN can cover a country, a continent, or global. The wider the coverage the more expensive the license. LAM is typically a local city, campus, or Lab. LAN is less cost per seat than WAN.
Node-locked or User-locked is less expensive than LAN. When faced with the increasing threat of software audits, ensuring you have an accurate compliance overview is essential.
You must ensure you understand your license contractual requirements, such as not utilizing geo-located licenses across state or international boundaries. Which can often be forgotten, for example, when a German license server has 40 spare licenses and the Indian server is suffering constant denials, sharing licenses from Germany to India would resolve the situation. But this would also lead to a non-compliant license situation, an easy mistake to make at system admin level and an event the auditors will look for immediately. Audits can become “very, very expensive”.
Software license audits are feared across the industry, but with the right planning and processes in place to ensure you have an accurate picture of your license asset, obligations, and usage, the level of risk is substantially mitigated.
TeamEDA’s LAMUM (License Asset Management and Usage Monitoring) product is the only industry toolset to combine asset management (tracking vendors, contacts, contractual documents, PO’s, etc) with a proprietary algorithm to ensure a 3 point check on actual license usage providing a holistic view of license assets and usage.
This information can then be used to inform decision makers for purchases and renewals, often saving our customers over 20% annually.