Microsoft Defends Planned Partner Program Changes, But Many Aren't Buying It (zdnet.com) 57
Last week, Microsoft quietly published information to its partner web site which made it clear that one of its program's main benefits -- internal use rights (IURs) -- would be axed in July 2020. Since then, Microsoft's been attempting to do damage control, including by holding a webcast that meant to shed more light on the reasoning behind the move. But most partners seem unconvinced about Microsoft's stated reasons, with more than a few saying they might go so far as to quit the partner program as a result. ZDNet: In a 20-minute recorded Ask Me Anything (AMA) entitled "Partner Transformation and Partner Business Investments" recorded on July 10, Microsoft execs talked about the priorities and trade-offs the company is making in regard to its partner program in fiscal 2020 and beyond. More than 230 partners attended the presentation live. (Note: It looks like Microsoft has removed the video of the AMA from YouTube.) Erez Wohl, General Manager of Business Strategy and Partner Investments in the One Commercial Partner organization, told partners that Microsoft "has the richest incentive portfolio in the industry," and that it would spend $400 million more on its partner program in fiscal 2020 (starting July 1, 2019) than it did in the previous year. He and his colleague Toby Richards, General Manager of Go-To-Market & Programs in the Microsoft One Commercial Partner organization, talked up some of the advanced specializations, new commerce capabilities and other new partner benefits that would be coming to the program this year.
But webcast attendees were largely there for one reason: To dispute Microsoft's plan to eliminate internal use rights. Yet Microsoft officials held fast to their stance, saying the company had to make some trade-offs in order to deliver on other priorities, such as making it easier for partners to connect with more users, partners and sellers. [...] For what it's worth, someone I know at Microsoft said Microsoft is currently incurring about $200 million in costs annually (and growing) resulting from its services being used by partners via IUR products. Update Microsoft capitulates and agrees to undo planned partner product-licensing changes.
But webcast attendees were largely there for one reason: To dispute Microsoft's plan to eliminate internal use rights. Yet Microsoft officials held fast to their stance, saying the company had to make some trade-offs in order to deliver on other priorities, such as making it easier for partners to connect with more users, partners and sellers. [...] For what it's worth, someone I know at Microsoft said Microsoft is currently incurring about $200 million in costs annually (and growing) resulting from its services being used by partners via IUR products. Update Microsoft capitulates and agrees to undo planned partner product-licensing changes.
Internal Use Rights (Score:5, Informative)
Literally no one who reads Slashdot knows what "Internal Use Rights" is. What is it?
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I came here to say this
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So did I. This is literally the first post I have ever made on here.
Re:Internal Use Rights (Score:4, Informative)
It is a program where as a partner you can use Microsoft products for own use without a separate lisence.
Basically you pay Microsoft a (fairly small) sum of money and fulfill the other conditions like having certified professionals and you get to you a varying number of the different products.
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You have to PAY Microsoft to use their products? What a world.
Re:Internal Use Rights (Score:5, Informative)
IUR is an incentive for the partner program, the benefits go both ways. Microsoft wouldn't do it if it didn't make sense. From Microsoft's POV their partners act as a revenue stream. Many of these are MSP and IT consulting firms and Microsoft wants them to use their products on projects. It makes sense to let them use the products internally if they are making sales for Microsoft. Usually these firms will be hired out for large scale projects, so its advantageous to let them run their HyperV cluster internally for free if they sale 5 clusters worth of licenses this month. Depending on how that is setup, what its doing and what year it is that could be a lot of licenses. M$ is notorious for changing their licensing scheme on a whim.
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The right to use Microsoft software internally. By being a partner you get licenses to use Microsoft software.
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Literally no one who reads Slashdot knows what "Internal Use Rights" is. What is it?
That's where you have the right to stick the install media up your ass, and whistle.
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Visio 2000 still has a better interface than Dia does today.
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Many people would argue that Visio 2000 had a better interface than the current version of Visio - and the same for the other components of Microsoft Office 2000.
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Literally no one. What does Internal Use Rights have to do with being in IT at a business using Microsoft products?
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Lots of MSPs join partner programs . I know of several local MSPs who are both M$ and Cisco partners and a few that are VMWare partners. Guess who's products they push?
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While most people may be thinking of "free licenses of Office", there is also the issue of server licensing for partners that keep varying degrees of product setups for clients for internal testing and education.
So, a consulting company that has clients using Sharepoint, Exchange, Dynamics, etc., might be running several versions of it in virtual machines to test integrations or effects of updates or simply to have to explore and learn.
These softwares are not cheap. If the company is expected to pay for eac
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When I was a consultant the IUR and vouchers for free technical support calls were invaluable.
I used the licensing rights to run the same server and client software as businesses that I was supporting.
This change is a real slap in the face to small operation consultants.
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What it means (Score:2)
Microsoft have a partner program called Action Pack with 3 levels, base, silver and gold.
Subscription gives you hundreds of keys, to internally use MS software commercially.
Eg, base subs gives you 3 MSDN subs, 10 office licences, 1 SQL server, etc etc to use internally for running you business for about $500/year.
It’s a good deal, and about the only reason people subscribe.
Summary: (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft used to let all paying "partners" use all their software for free. Nowadays, they are doing nothing other than pushing everyone in their shitty, broken, worthless spy-"cloud" system, meaning Microsoft suddenly has to pay for all the stuff those freeloaders use, instead of the freeloaders running copies of Microsoft's software on their own hardware. And that's why they are no longer interested in giving this away, because it suddenly has an actual cost for Microsoft.
Re: Summary: (Score:1)
I still have my office 97 license. Works great even without the assistant.
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I still have an Office 97 MSDN CD. It works great, too, to the extent that Office 97 still works great. (It's a little flaky on Win7 x64. And even on Windows XP it doesn't handle multiple monitors correctly. Menus pop open on the primary display even when you click their activation handle on the secondary one...)
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it doesn't handle multiple monitors correctly. Menus pop open on the primary display even when you click their activation handle on the secondary one...
Is the secondary monitor left of the primary? If so the coordinates for that monitor will be negative, and I've seen a number of programs that won't place objects on negative coordinates, but instead at 0.
Its good (Score:2, Insightful)
This is good for the market
Now smaller shops won't/can't recommend o365 and that's a good thing in my opinion. We need more people deploying alternatives in the trenches
Out of all people.... (Score:2)
This is litterally the entire point of partnership (Score:4, Insightful)
There are no other useful benefit to the program. Market / listing bits are nothing more than spam magnets nobody actually takes seriously.
This is like an ice-cream truck driver selling a daily ice cream delivery service for a yearly rate and then deciding instead they would just drive around and blare the ice cream music instead of actually delivering the goods.
How Microsoft thinks... (Score:1)
IUR is complicated as the world moves to cloud (Score:2)
Back when most software was 100% on premise, there was zero cost to a company to offer free software keys to partners for development and testing.
Nowadays, most all software has some kind of cloud component that is fundamental to its operation, and many are 100% cloud delivered SaaS. When you use a SaaS, or Office 365 which us using cloud delivered services, it is no longer free for MIcrosoft - it is now physically costing them dollars to run infrastructure to support you, while they get zero revenue in ret
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I thought the whole point of the partnership program was that it benefited companies that sold products integrated with Microsoft software. With more users switching to Linux every day and now partnership programs that peddle Microsoft wares getting screwed, I think it would be beneficial to Microsoft to keep the existing rules of the partnership program. With that said, I think Microsoft needs to be knocked down a few pegs and I'm perfectly fine if they keep poking t
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I don't think its a function of it costs them directly so much as its a opportunity to squeeze some additional revenue for a couple years and dry up a channel they don't really want any more.
The Microsoft of old made they money bribing box pushing VARs to hock their product. Being a Microsoft partner required doing minimal sales volumes and having certain numbers of MS certified people on staff. Neither of those things was easy to do without substantial commitment but.. you got the IRUs which both allowed
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I think this is exactly right.
As an employee at a shop that is a Microsoft partner I keep trying to explain to my colleagues what a fool's errand it is to us to keep pushing our own customers into cloud solutions even when there is (for now, anyway) an on-premise solution that is easier, faster and more reliable to migrate customers to. But no, they keep fawning over MS cloud.
The great joke in 10 years is going to be how MS fooled its more idiotic MSP partners to GIVE AWAY all their business to Microsoft f
Pushing to the cloud and service models (Score:1)
Microsoft has backpedaled on this (Score:1)
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In other news, Microsoft has announced the hiring of Carrie Lam into an unspecified senior executive position.
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Here's the announcement: https://blogs.partner.microsof... [blogs.partner.microsof]
Personally I think the damage is already done. The threat alone is sufficient to get people to re-evaluate their choices. MS is getting too greedy at a time where viable alternatives have never been easier to grasp.
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"Each year we review how we engage with partners" -> translation this was our warning shot we will try it again or maybe find a way to slowly destroy the value of the spiffs over the course of the next few years.