Can You Address the Software Licensing Implications that Come with it?

Whatever your take on it, the cloud is here in one form or another and large enterprises are not the only ones that have to be prepared for this research – software vendors and intelligent device manufacturers ought to be ready, too.

The way people think about purchasing

"Cloud-based computing has transformed the way people think about purchasing and consuming business software," Flexera Software official John Lipsey wrote in a recent blog post. "Like ala carte dining to put it more exactly than all you can eat, the Cloud has opened up utterly new revenue streams for providers to enable value based on new delivery models just as burst-of-use and pay-per-use, to name a couple."

Recently the company took to its blog to discuss the many software licensing implications that are tied to cloud computing and they all assume that application producers can track their clients' software usage and enforce it according to the relevant licensing arrangement, according to Lipsey.

But, according to Flexera’s 2011 Key Trends in Software Pricing & Licensing Survey, software vendors and intelligent device manufactures on the whole have a ways to go when it comes figuring out software licensing in the cloud. As revealed in the survey, 47 percent of application producers say they either do not have innovation in place that enables them to know what product, product version or platforms their clients are using – or they simply do not know.

The fluidity in innovation

"Given the fluidity in innovation and the need to accommodate new and evolving ways clients will be consuming software in the Cloud – one thing is certain," Lipsey writes. "Flexible, consistent licensing will be essential – across all product lines – licensing in other words capable of accommodating the range of anticipated usage models – from on premises, to SaaS, Virtualized and the Cloud."