Microsoft Licensing News

WHAT'S HAPPENING: Microsoft 365 Multi-Geo capabilities coming to CSP

WHEN: June 1, 2023

Beginning June 1, 2023, the Multi-Geo capabilities add-on SKU will be available to purchase through the CSP program. Previously this was only available to EA customers.

Microsoft 365 Multi-Geo will be sold as an add-on SKU with three purchase options available:

• One-year subscription paid monthly
• One-year subscription paid annually
• One-month trial subscription

Because this add-on SKU is user level, you will need to purchase a subscription license for each user to be hosted in your satellite geography location. The Multi-Geo licenses purchased must be equal to or greater than 5 percent of the total eligible Microsoft 365 subscription seats.

WHAT'S HAPPENING: Limited Project Online functionality added to certain Microsoft 365 & Office 365 plans

WHEN: March 15, 2023

Users assigned with certain Microsoft 365 or Office 365 subscriptions are allowed to have limited edit access to projects that are shared with them without needing to be assigned a Project subscription.

The below subscriptions will now have view access:

• Microsoft 365 F3 and Office 365 F3
• Office 365 E1
• Microsoft 365 for business
• Microsoft E3 and Office 365 E3
• Microsoft E5 and Office 365 E5

Microsoft 365 and Office 365 users with E3 and E5 licenses have limited edit access as well, they can now mark a task as complete, or update the task progress or “% complete” of a task assigned to them in any project they have permissions to.

If your Microsoft 365 or Office 365 user needs to edit or create projects or roadmaps, you'll need to purchase the appropriate Project subscription and assign it to the user.

You can review the full feature comparison here: Microsoft Project for the web service description - Service Descriptions | Microsoft Learn

WHAT'S HAPPENING: Clarification of SQL Server licensing change for virtual instances

WHEN: December 1, 2022

We would like to call attention to a change that Microsoft made to the Product Terms with the release of SQL Server 2022:

Server Licenses (per core) – Licensing by Individual Virtual OSE

**Available for subscription licenses or licenses with active Software Assurance only:**

1. Customer may use any number of Running Instances of the server software in any Virtual OSE on the Licensed Server, provided it acquires sufficient Licenses as described below.
2. The number of Licenses required equals the number of Virtual Cores in the Virtual OSE, subject to a minimum of four Licenses per Virtual OSE.
3. If any Virtual Core is at any time mapped to more than one Hardware Thread, Customer needs a License for each Hardware Thread to which it is mapped.
4. Customer may reassign any of its Licenses to any of its Licensed Servers located within the same Server Farm as often as needed. Customer may also reassign these Licenses from one Server Farm to another, but not on a short-term basis (i.e., not within 90 days of the last assignment).

This is a change from the previous product terms, where you could license SQL Server for a virtual OSE whether you had purchased with Software Assurance or not. This change of terms will impact customers buying new SQL licenses only. If you had purchased SQL Server before this change, then you would be governed by the terms that were current when you purchased the original license. If you buy a new license, and intend to license by virtual cores, you must include SA (even if you plan on using downgrade rights to install an older version of SQL).

WHAT'S HAPPENING: Teams Rooms Standard and Premium will be retired under the CSP program

WHEN: May 24, 2023

As of May 24, 2023, subscriptions for Teams Rooms Standard or Premium will not auto-renew at the end of their term. If you have Standard and Premium licenses and want to keep Teams Rooms, you will need to acquire the Teams Rooms Pro or Basic SKUs before your current Standard and Premium subscriptions expire.

You can review the features of the new offerings here:  Teams Rooms Plans and Pricing | Microsoft 365