System Center Transition Approaching

System Center 2012 introduces major licensing changes. The products will no longer be offered separately but must be licensed in bundles containing rights to use up to eight components. Although Microsoft offers existing customers attractive options for transitioning to the new bundles, pricing changes require customers to quickly evaluate purchasing options, and customers who want to use only one System Center product will find it substantially more expensive to do so in the future. Customers wanting to expand existing deployments of pre-2012 System Center products on the most attractive terms need to act quickly.

Act Now to Get Individual Licenses

As in earlier versions, the System Center 2012 components require management licenses (MLs) for computers and other devices that they manage. With System Center 2012, Microsoft has eliminated all licenses for the individual products in favor of suites of MLs. While the reliance on suites reduce the number of license types customers must contend with, customers who want to use only one System Center component (for example, Operations Manager) will find it substantially more expensive to do so, since they will have to buy license suites. However, some of the pre-2012 System Center licenses will continue to be available for a limited period of time, and some Software Assurance (SA) renewal options are available until Sept. 30, 2012. (For full details, see the illustration “Purchasing Pre-2012 System Center Licenses“.)