What is ELA - Enterprise license agreement

[shank1]

What is ELA - Enterprise license agreement? Is it like you can have unlimited installs by paying once

or 

is it like there will be a limit.. still you can legally use any number installations, but you true up when that limit is crossed?

https://community.servicenow.com/community?id=community_question&sys_id=b540c3a1db98dbc01dcaf3231f96196f

Also does the meaning change for each vendor/publisher (Microsoft, Cisco etc.)

@bsweetser  @Alex Panzarella  @Rohit Lobo 

Thanks in advance 🙂

[Alex Panzarella · Accepted solution]

Enterprise License Agreement (ELA) can mean different things to different organizations. In the ServiceNow SAM entitlement module selecting "ELA" as the agreement type makes it so you can't be out of compliance for that product.

For example, say I have an agreement with TechSmith that I can consume as much as I want, but I have to buy more licenses at the end of the performance period (no fee). You would use the ELA agreement type because even if you bought 10 and are using 20 there isn't a real compliance issue that is auditable.

[shank1]

@Alex Panzarella Thank you for replying.

May I know what exactly you meant by "end of the performance period".

Also when we talk about "consume as much as we want" which is unlimited --> here is it really unlimited or will there be still some threshold.

I am asking this because, for Cisco ELA, below is what they say 

"Cisco includes what it calls a 20% "growth allowance" in every license. A customer, for example, could exceed the number of users up to the allotment without having to change the agreement. Companies that exceed the allocation can modify the license without having to pay a retroactive charge."

link - https://community.cisco.com/t5/smart-services-blogs/cisco-unveils-a-single-ela-enterprise-license-agreement-covering/ba-p/3105199

so I guess meaning of ELA varies from publisher to publisher and in ServiceNow, immaterial of the actual meaning, if we choose it as ELA, it will always show as compliant, right.

I would really be thankful to you if you could share some light on this topic.

[Alex Panzarella]

When I said "end of performance period" I meant unlimited agreements have a date when the unlimited period ends (ex. four year unlimited agreement).

For your use case you could go either way depending on how you want to see it. I would probably use the "Generic" license type because you still have to true-up the amount at the end of it, so it would be useful to see if you're exceeding your license amount.