Category Archives: Uncategorized

Update on Microsoft Reservations

Microsoft Reservations are a way of pre-paying for certain Azure services to get the best possible pricing. The first Reservation from Microsoft was a Reserved Instance – a way of paying upfront for the compute part of a virtual machine – and Microsoft continues to extend what, and where, Reservations are available.

In February 2019, Microsoft announced that Reserved Instance discounts had been extended to apply both to Classic Virtual Machines and Cloud Services, and that Reserved Instances could be applied to Dev/Test Subscriptions acquired through an Enterprise Agreement or through Azure.com. Find that announcement here: http://bit.ly/2KEIVdP.

More recently, in April 2019, they announced that the Reservations family had grown to include two new members. Firstly,

SQL Data Warehouse Reserved Capacity allows customers to buy compute Data Warehouse Units (cDWU) with either 1-year or 3-year options for discounts of up to 65%. Reserved Capacity can be shared by multiple warehouses in the same region and there are exchange and cancel options available if business needs change. Secondly, there are new RedHat Enterprise Linux Software Plans where the rules are stricter in terms of exchanging and cancelling, but discounts of up to 18% are still available.

Find the announcement and get further details here: http://bit.ly/2Mzvq1D.

Dynamics 365 Business Central Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (June 2019) Dynamics 365 Business Central Licensing Guide. There are just a couple of minor changes: links to the document that gives more information on how Team Members licences work in Business Central is moved to the Dynamics 365 Licensing FAQ, and there’s a new appendix added listing configuration components. Find this guide here: http://bit.ly/MSLicensingGuides.

Selling Azure through CSP

If you’re a partner selling Azure through CSP then you’ll be interested in a new Microsoft blog post where some upcoming changes are detailed about a new Azure experience in CSP, and the introduction of both the existing Microsoft Customer Agreement and a new Microsoft Partner Agreement in CSP. Get the full details including expected timelines here: http://bit.ly/2Ilm4l1.

Licensing System Center Endpoint Protection

There’s a new table added to page 33 of the June 2019 Product Terms document that lists the licences that provide entitlement to System Center Endpoint Protection. Find the Product Terms document here: http://bit.ly/MSproductterms.

Multi-Geo Capabilities in Office 365

Microsoft change the minimum requirements for the Multi-Geo capabilities in Office 365 from 2,500 Office 365 licences to 500. What is Multi-Geo? Essentially it allows a single Office 365 tenant to span across multiple Office 365 data centre geographies and gives customers the ability to store their Exchange and OneDrive data, at-rest, on a per-user basis, in their chosen geographies. You can imagine this helps some organisations to meet their data residency requirements.

Find out more about Multi-Geo here: http://bit.ly/2EOBkWx and see page 61 of the June 2019 Product Terms for an overview of the licensing requirements. Find the Product Terms document here: http://bit.ly/MSproductterms.

Windows 7 ESU Promotion

Microsoft add a new promotion which entitles certain users to receive free Windows 7 Extended Security Updates. The rules? The users must be licensed with Windows E5, Microsoft 365 E5 or Microsoft 365 E5 Security through an Enterprise Agreement or Enterprise Agreement Subscription as of December 31, 2019. They’ll be able to use up to five devices to run a local installation of Windows covered by Windows 7 ESU 2020, or access virtual machines.

For the full details see page 104 of the June 2019 Product Terms document. Find the Product Terms document here: http://bit.ly/MSproductterms.

Licensing FSLogix

Microsoft acquired FSLogix in November 2018 to extend their desktop and app virtualisation capabilities (http://bit.ly/2HRFDlY) and with the arrival of the Windows Virtual Desktop public preview they confirmed that FSLogix technologies enable faster load times for non-persistent users accessing Outlook or OneDrive, and that both client and server RDS deployments will be supported (http://bit.ly/2HPbqo2).

The June 2019 Product Terms adds text confirming that users licensed for Microsoft 365 Business, F1, E3 and E5, Windows E3 and E5, and VDA E3 and E5 may use FSLogix software (page 43), as may users licensed with RDS CALs or SLs (page 47).

Find the Product Terms here: http://bit.ly/MSproductterms.

Microsoft Kaizala

Microsoft Kaizala is a simple and secure mobile chat app for work – think the WhatsApp you know with a whole load of features added for businesses.

If you’re new to the world of Kaizala you can download the free mobile app for your iPhone or Android phone, and there’s a great interactive demo to get you started here: http://bit.ly/2X27wN4.

Kaizala Pro adds additional management and reporting features and you can see a summary of these additional features at the bottom of this page: http://bit.ly/2X3mVwI. A recent announcement from Microsoft confirms that Kaizala Pro is rolling out globally from April 2019 and is included in Office 365 F1, E1, E3, E5, Business Essentials, and Business Premium licences.

We can also expect Kaizala functionality integrated into Teams in the next 12-18 months. Find that announcement here: http://bit.ly/2EzHp92.

Visual Studio subscriptions with GitHub Enterprise

Microsoft announce that EA customers can now purchase a Visual Studio subscription with GitHub Enterprise for a combined, lower price.

Find the announcement here: http://bit.ly/2X5k9ac and find out more about GitHub Enterprise here: http://bit.ly/2KdnuRd.

Windows 10 version 1903

Microsoft announce (http://bit.ly/30HUJSt) that the latest Semi-Annual Channel release of Windows 10 (version 1903) is now available to download from VLSC.

With this version, Subscription Activation now gives education customers the ability to step-up from Windows 10 Pro Education to Windows 10 Education eliminating the need to manually deploy Windows 10 images and then provide activation keys.

Find full details of Windows 10 Subscription Activation here: http://bit.ly/2HDPprD.