Category Archives: Uncategorized

Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare

Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare is added to the November 2020 Product Terms.

This is an add-on licence with a variety of qualifying licences dependent on which healthcare scenarios are important to you in the areas of enhanced patient engagement, empowering health team collaboration, or improved clinical and operational insights.

The licence is available through the Enterprise Agreement and costs $95 per user per month. The different qualifying licences and the scenarios they light up are detailed in a pricing datasheet which you can find here: https://bit.ly/3976nwv, and there’s a useful overview datasheet on the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare solution here: https://bit.ly/370gmRI.

Advanced Communications changes

Microsoft launched Advanced Communications in August 2020 to support larger Teams meetings, custom-branded lobbies, and integration with Compliance Recording and Contact Center APIs.

There are a couple of changes to be aware of: an Advanced Communications licence is now not required for the Compliance Recording API and can be used until 31 January 2021 at no additional charge, and the Contact Center API is no longer a component of Advanced Communications.

Find details of these changes here: https://bit.ly/2Uajvsg where you’ll also find a useful FAQ.

In addition, the temporary increase of limits in Teams meetings is extended to all customers until January 1, 2021 – find details of that here: https://bit.ly/3pQv3PP.

Common Data Service is now Dataverse

Microsoft announce that the Common Data Service (where you securely store and manage data that’s used by the Dynamics products, for example) has been rebranded as Microsoft Dataverse.

At the same time, Dataverse for Teams (formerly known as Project Oakdale) is also generally available. This is a subset of Dataverse capabilities included as a built-in data platform for Teams that, along with tools such as the new Power Apps app for Teams, enables customers to build low-code apps, automate processes, and deploy chatbots without leaving Teams.

Find the Dataverse announcement here: https://bit.ly/399Xv9x, and an overview of what you can now do in Teams here: https://bit.ly/35RmPPy.

Base and Additive CAL overview

If you’re new to Base and Additive CALs then you may find this new (October 2020) overview document from Microsoft useful. It explains software dependency licence requirements, Base and Additive CALs, external user access, and ends with some FAQs.

Find this document here: https://bit.ly/35fchcB.

Windows 10 Qualifying Operating Systems

There’s a new (October 2020) Microsoft Licensing Brief to help you to answer questions around Windows 10 Qualifying Operating Systems.

Note though, that it’s not yet updated for the changes that were made to page 42 of the November 2020 Product Terms whereby Windows 10 Home licences are now qualifying licences for academic customers buying through CSP.

Find this document here: https://bit.ly/38xPnPR.

Licensing Windows Server for use with virtualisation technologies

There’s an updated (August 2020) Microsoft Licensing Brief to detail the licensing of Windows Server for use with virtualisation technologies.

There are just small updates made, but this is a useful document if you’re pondering how containers are licensed, how Windows Server licensing changes with VMware or Virtuozzo, or how you license Windows Server for use on Microsoft Azure.

Find this document here: https://bit.ly/3jOPnwN.

Dynamics 365 Business Central on-premises Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (October 2020) Dynamics 365 Business Central on-premises Licensing Guide.

The most major change is perhaps from a reformatting perspective – there has been a bit of reordering of the content and there’s a new front cover.

In addition, there are some tables added to the list for Team Members in Appendix A.

Find this updated guide here: https://bit.ly/35THbGM.

Azure VMware solution

Microsoft announce the General Availability of the Azure VMware solution enabling customers to seamlessly move VMware-based workloads from their data centres to Azure and integrate their VMware environment with Azure.

What’s interesting from a licensing perspective is that if customers are running Windows Server and SQL Server workloads then they can use the Azure Hybrid Benefit to reuse existing on-premises licences, and they can also save money on the infrastructure by purchasing Reserved Instances.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/34IRm1H, and information on the solution itself here: https://bit.ly/3ow1DWH.

Azure Hybrid Benefit for Linux preview

Microsoft announce a further extension to the Azure Hybrid Benefit, this time for Linux virtual machines.

Now customers can bring their own Red Hat Enterprise Linux and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server subscriptions to a virtual machine in Azure and just pay for the infrastructure charges.

Customers can apply this Azure Hybrid Benefit to either existing or new virtual machines.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/35J8F1H, and instructions on participating in the preview for this new benefit here: https://bit.ly/2Tqh4S5.