It’s a bizarre month these days when a Forefront product has the most interesting licensing changes in the Product List but that’s exactly what we find this April!

Forefront Identity Manager (FIM) 2010 R2 exited the Product List last month but sneaks back in this month with some changes to the licensing. Essentially, the right to install FIM is moved to Windows Server 2012 R2 (see page 39) and those customers who had active SA on FIM 2010 R2 at 1 April 2015 are deemed to have 1 Windows Server Datacenter licence. There aren’t, however, changes to the licensing of users accessing FIM functionality – see this article for which licences can be used: http://wp.me/p3K5IZ-et.

The other main changes are to do with some name changes – Microsoft Social Listening is rebranded as Microsoft Social Engagement – again more details are here: http://wp.me/p3K5IZ-ep and Lync Online changes to Skype for Business Online, all ready for its launch in the middle of April.

Finally, the information on the upgrade rights for customers who had SA coverage for SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse on 1 March 1 2013 is removed, and there’s a reference back to the March 2014 Product List.