License Advisory

Strategic licensing advice for all software publishers

Optimize your software licensing strategy to ensure a cost-effective and compliant IT environment with help from SHI’s licensing experts.

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With advice from SHI’s licensing specialists, you can navigate the line between optimizing costs and minimizing compliance risk.

With more than 30 years licensing experience across thousands of software publishers, SHI's knowledge of software licensing is second-to-none. It's quite literally the foundation of our success.

All our customers have access to our large team of dedicated licensing experts. These ridiculously helpful and experienced licensing analysts will answer your licensing questions, assist with renewals and contract negotiation, help you evaluate different program options, and ensure you get the best possible pricing.

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With the right help, software licensing can be easy

With SHI as your partner, you’ll have access to years of experience from hundreds of experienced licensing analysts with knowledge of an astonishing range of vendors, programs, and products.

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Licensing insights

Your organization needs up to date licensing information for all your key products and vendors at a moment’s notice. SHI can provide strategic license advice for more than 40 software publishers, giving you access to dedicated subject matter expertise for each vendor's programs, products, policies, and processes.

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Enduring relationships

Many of SHI’s customer relationships date back over 30 years. With experience providing licensing advice for some of the most complex environments, you can be sure we'll assess your unique needs and landscape and tailor a program that aligns to your current business strategy, while keeping future plans in mind.

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Emerging vendors

The software landscape is constantly changing, with new technology vendors emerging who provide new solutions to new (and old) problems. Our Emerging Partners Team research new software and cloud offerings to ensure that we build relationships and expertise to support the vendors and products that matter to you.

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Vendor certification

In order to provide the best possible advice, we ensure that our licensing analysts are vendor-certified, whether they specialize in offerings from the software mega vendors or our emerging software partners. From perpetual licenses to SaaS subscriptions, we are authorized to advise on all our partners' licensing.

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Expert advice to support your most pressing licensing needs

Because our licensing experts are highly specialized, they can provide detailed advice based on your specific use case and know which terms and conditions apply to your situation. They take any existing contracts or licensing into account – and they can explain the options when exploring new vendors and contracts, modelling the options available to you.

SHI’s relationships with our software partners ensure that our licensing teams are always up to date on programmatic and product licensing changes.

Contact a licensing specialist today 

Expert License Advisory Teams

SHI has dedicated license advisors to help you optimize your software spending. They are on hand to support you throughout the entire software lifecycle from research and program evaluation, through contracting, deployment, and optimization, to renewal or replacement.

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Microsoft Specialists

With a team of over 100 experts on hand to review your contract terms and work through various licensing scenarios, we act as trusted partners, offering consulting and strategic advice to ensure your Enterprise Agreement (EA) or Cloud Solutions Provider (CSP) contract is fully optimized as your business needs change.

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Adobe Specialists

A longstanding Adobe Platinum Partner and Worldwide Channel Partner of the Year award recipient, SHI manages over 16,000 VIP agreements across all segments and proudly sits on the Adobe Partner Advisory Board where we help create the direction for our partner program and influence Adobe products in the marketplace.

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Cisco Specialists

Our Cisco licensing consultants understand the importance of aligning your technology acquisition with its deployment. Our Cisco EA and SMARTNet expertise provide you with flexibility and control so your Cisco licensing drives successful adoption and return on your technology investment, while reducing your TCO.

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VMware Specialists

With hundreds of Enterprise License Agreements (ELAs) under active management, our team of experts is focused on strategic license advisory and solution deployment services. This includes a quarterly review of entitlements and installation for every ELA customer to ensure they are licensed and deployed effectively.

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Answers to your most pressing licensing questions

We’re often asked questions such as:

  • How easy is it to true-up or true-down based on my hiring needs?
  • How do I decide if an on-premises or a cloud-based subscription model works better for me?
  • Is an enterprise-wide agreement really right for my organization?
  • Will a multi-year purchase save my organization money?
  • Our company just divested part of our organization. Can I true down my upcoming renewal/subscription?
  • Will a move to the cloud save me money and give me long-term flexibility?

SHI’s ridiculously helpful experts can work with you to establish the answers to all these questions and more.

Contact a licensing specialist today 

Are you ready to put our licensing knowledge to the test?

Reach out to your licensing Account Executive or contact us today!

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