Server License Consolidation Benefit Examples

Most organizations have a server environment that grows over time to meet business demands. Keeping up with the deployment of server hardware and accompanying VMs (servers), the utilization of physical hosts (hardware), and the changes to Microsoft licensing rules and technology stack is a daunting effort. As a result, the natural growth of server environments typically includes licensing and resource inefficiencies that cost customers hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars each year in extra licensing expense.

The following are examples of organizations that undertook server license consolidation efforts and their resulting benefits:

Healthcare. A national healthcare company had a server environment with 8,000 VMs (servers). The organization had completed a VM consolidation effort the previous year to maximize hardware capacity but had ignored the need to optimize license usage. A follow-on server license consolidation analysis identified a lack of licensing rules knowledge, and by applying new server licensing rights and consolidating SQL Server and Windows Server VMs onto just 5% fewer physical hosts, the organization realized a licensing savings of US$5 million over three years.