Cost-based licensing optimization for Microsoft

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 6 minutes to read
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    Summary of Cost-based licensing optimization for Microsoft

    The cost-based licensing optimization for Microsoft, included in the Software Asset Management Professional plugin, helps ServiceNow customers automatically balance license compliance and cost effectiveness for Microsoft software products across hybrid infrastructures. It enables maximizing cost savings by recommending optimal licensing approaches, while allowing optional manual management of license allocations to align with organizational strategies. This optimization supports key Microsoft license types, such as per core licenses for SQL Server and BizTalk Server, and per core (with CAL) licenses for Windows Server, Core Infrastructure Server, and System Center.

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    Key Features

    • Automatically determines cost savings achieved through current entitlements and infrastructure.
    • Recommends optimizations to further reduce licensing costs and improve compliance.
    • Provides detailed insights into each recommended licensing optimization for informed decision-making.
    • Specialized optimization for Microsoft Windows Server Standard on Hyper-V clusters, licensing both physical hosts and individual VMs to reduce overall costs.
    • Allows bypassing automatic optimization via preferred licensing assignments for Microsoft products deployed on hypervisor clusters.
    • Multiple views and reports for monitoring and managing licensing optimizations:
      • Microsoft Core License Optimization Reports table for detailed optimization data.
      • SAM Cluster 360º view to analyze licensing optimizations by cluster.
      • Optimization and savings dashboard within Software Asset Workspace for potential and realized cost savings reports.

    Practical Application

    ServiceNow customers can use this optimization to understand both realized and potential cost savings from their Microsoft software entitlements, optimize licensing strategies across hybrid environments, and adjust allocations manually if desired. The specialized Hyper-V optimization helps reduce costs by combining physical and virtual licensing. Reporting tools enable continuous monitoring and analysis, supporting effective license management and strategic decision-making.

    The cost-based licensing optimization for Microsoft helps you determine the most optimal way to license your Microsoft software products across hybrid infrastructures. With this optimization, you can automatically balance license compliance with cost effectiveness to maximize cost savings.

    Note:
    This licensing optimization is automatically included in the Software Asset Management Professional (com.snc.samp) plugin, meaning that you do not have to optimize and manage allocations for your Microsoft software rights manually. However, you can choose to manage your allocations manually if the recommended licensing optimizations do not follow your organization's licensing strategy. See Allocation Management on ServiecNow SAM Pro for more details on manual allocation management.
    Note:
    You can bypass this licensing optimization in your hypervisor clusters by applying preferred licensing assignments to the Microsoft software products that are deployed on those clusters. For more information on preferred licensing assignments, see Create preferred licensing assignments for Microsoft software products deployed on clusters.
    This licensing optimization is supported by the following Microsoft license types:
    • Per core licenses for Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft BizTalk Server
    • Per core (with CAL) licenses for Microsoft Windows Server, Microsoft Core Infrastructure Server, and Microsoft System Center
    See Supported Microsoft license types for more information on per core and per core (with CAL) licenses.

    Licensing optimization benefits

    This licensing optimization provides the following benefits:
    • Helps you determine the cost savings that you have already achieved through your current software entitlement and infrastructure setup.
    • Helps you determine if you can achieve further cost savings by following recommended licensing optimizations.
    • Helps you gain insight into each of the recommended licensing optimizations so that you can understand the reasoning behind them and determine if you want to follow or ignore them.

    Licensing optimization for Microsoft Server products deployed on Microsoft Hyper-V virtualization technology

    For Microsoft Windows Server Standard deployments on Microsoft Hyper-V virtualization technology, the Software Asset Management application supports a specialized licensing optimization that can help you achieve better cost efficiency. With this licensing optimization, the Software Asset Management application first licenses the physical hosts that contain Microsoft Windows Server Standard installations. It then licenses the individual VMs that contain Microsoft Windows Server Standard installations. This optimization strategy combines licensing at both the physical host layer and virtual layer, which can help reduce licensing requirements and costs.

    Understanding your licensing optimizations

    You can view and gain insight into your recommended licensing optimizations by using the following tables and views: