MetrixData 360

08/31/2026

🤔Is it possible to avoid Microsoft Copilot "Co-Work" consumption billing shock? Here is what tech leads need to know:

https://hubs.li/Q04vXKR30

08/28/2026

How much money is hiding in your Microsoft Visio licenses?
For one tenant, the answer was $15,000–$20,000 a year — found in 15 minutes.

The breakdown:
1. 150 Visio Plan 2 seats assigned ($15/user/month, includes desktop access)
2. 100 of those seats — zero activity in the last 30 days
3. 15 more — web-only usage, never once touched the desktop app they were licensed for
4. Result: downgrade the dormant seats, move the web-only users to Plan 1 ($5/user/month), recover roughly $15K–$20K a year

Why this stays invisible on most tenants: usage data tells you a license was used. It can't tell you it was over-tiered. Those are two different datasets — one tracks activity, the other tracks entitlement — and nothing in Microsoft's native reporting reconciles them for you.

Visio and Project also don't have the API integration that Teams, SharePoint, and Exchange have, so most SAM tools can't automate this check either. It comes down to a manual CSV export and a spreadsheet join. In 2026, "manual" usually just means "never checked."

Run the same math on Project licenses and the number gets bigger fast — $24,000+ a year for 100 over-tiered users is a common finding.

The fix isn't complicated: a 90-day usage window, a filter for licensed users only, and 15 minutes before your next Microsoft renewal — not after.

Ben Tight walks through the full method, including the exact filters and the traps that inflate false savings, here:
https://hubs.li/Q04vxMK90

See how Microsoft Visio license optimization uncovered $15,000 in annual savings by identifying unused licenses and users on the wrong Visio plan.

08/27/2026

📢Join us today at 11:30am ET! Mike Austin will discuss what happens when IT, SAM, and procurement teams start seeing their vendor renewals as one connected negotiation instead of separate ones, and what that connected view is worth at the table.

Join here: https://hubs.li/Q04vwSkt0

08/26/2026

Two deadlines just closed a loophole a lot of IT leaders were counting on.
Microsoft is retiring the license-included version of Azure VMware Solution: October 31, 2026 for pay-as-you-go, August 30, 2027 for reserved instances.

Moving VMware into Azure was never a way out of Broadcom's pricing. It just moved the invoice. Every AVS customer ends up negotiating with Broadcom either way. The only question is when.

Here is what to verify before your next renewal:

The retirement of Microsoft's Azure VMware Solution will take place by October 2026 and August 2027. Here's the reason why moving to Azure never got you off Broadcom.

08/24/2026

This Thursday, Aug 27: When Microsoft, Oracle, Salesforce, and IBM negotiations all touch the same budget and the same leverage points, treating them separately means giving up ground in all of them at once.

In this live expert session, Mike Austin, will discuss what happens when IT, SAM, and procurement teams start seeing their vendor renewals as one connected negotiation instead of separate ones, and what that connected view is worth at the table.

Reserve your spot here: https://hubs.li/Q04t-Pxt0

08/21/2026

Meet our very own Mike AI. Trained on MetrixData 360's deep approach to Microsoft and Azure renewals, EA timing, negotiation strategy, and enterprise software asset management.

This is your quick way to get a straight answer on renewal timing or audit exposure without waiting for a callback. If you're staring down an EA renewal and don't know where to start, start there.
https://hubs.li/Q04tR2KM0

08/20/2026

The seat count on your ServiceNow renewal isn't the one you remember.

You had about 1,600 people who approve things.

Now, ServiceNow says you need roughly 3,100 stakeholder licenses to cover them.

Nobody hired 1,500 new approvers.

Here's what happened.

ServiceNow reviewed everyone who touched an approval and determined that they now require a paid stakeholder license.

Someone who can approve a single purchase order can become a billable user.

Multiply that across every workflow in the platform, and your approver population suddenly doubles on paper without adding a single employee.

And this conversation usually happens at renewal, when your options are the most limited.

Here's what matters.

That number is based on their data, and it may not be telling the whole story.

Many of those users approved a single request all year or sit in approval groups that are often restructured before renewal, rather than being licensed individually.

When you map actual approval activity against the licensing rules, the seat count can come down quickly.

Do that before you accept the renewal quote, not after you sign it.

If a vendor's data says one thing, but you think it's something else, do you know what to do? Do you have the process to correct it before it's too late?

Have you ever independently validated a software vendor's license count before accepting a renewal, or did you assume their number was correct? What was the result?

08/19/2026

Adobe licensing used to be predictable.
Now it moves with user identity, product mix, and contract structure.

The result?
Many enterprises no longer know their true effective exposure until renewal or audit pressure appears.

This breakdown explains why Adobe licensing risk is no longer static and what it means for enterprise governance.

Read it here:
👉 https://hubs.li/Q04tyWpX0

08/18/2026

Your organization might be looking for Microsoft licensing risk in a wrong place. The biggest exposure isn't inside Microsoft 365.

Mike Austin explains what areas to pay attention to: https://hubs.li/Q04tlpzF0

08/14/2026

Most IT organizations believe they have a mature SAM program because someone is actively managing it. Vacation season exposes a SAM risk most enterprises never plan for.

https://hubs.li/Q04s-3Kh0