ITAM Review Oracle Seminar NY Levy LeGette Presentation

Platinum Sponsor

Ania Levy, Levy LeGette LLC

Delivering Oracle Licensing Cost Savings

Through Effective Contract Negotiations

ITAM Review Oracle Seminar, New York May 15th 2015

Platinum Sponsor

Negotiating with Oracle: A Dark Art


Platinum Sponsor

The case of a Global Financial Enterprise


• Failed audit• Huge penalties (£150,000+)• Oracle were unhelpful and showed aggressive auditing tactics

• Oracle stated that there was “no room for negotiation”• Client had been in negotiations with Oracle for 8 months• We concluded the agreement in 6 weeks with no penalties

Platinum Sponsor

Establishing a level playing field


• There is no such thing as a failed audit• £150,000 fine was not paid out• We moved the entire process from the UK to the US as the Oracle

contact was extremely unhelpful• Moving the agreement to the US meant we had a new point of contact• The UK Oracle contact missed out on his commission!

Platinum Sponsor

Lessons Learned


• Interference with your efforts is as likely to come from your own executives

• Capitulating in order to settle disputes quickly is the hallmark of your C Suite - not Oracle’s.

• Insist on dealing only with Oracle’s most senior Sales manager with the authority to say “Yes!” during negotiations

• A Final Report in the wrong hands could mean something entirely different

Platinum Sponsor

How can Oracle audit?


• The Oracle license agreement contains only a single statement relating to licensing use & restriction:

“Software is considered to be in use when installed and running on a processor”• Oracle license agreements contain a proliferation of URLs that direct the

licensee to documents seemingly intended to modify that single license use rule.

• However, the documents contain footers prohibiting the terms to be used to construe the meaning of the contract.

• This would mean no core-based licensing; no counting of cores; no logging of VMS or instances in a virtual environment per Oracle’s extra-contractual terms; and, no maintaining logs for 2 years for on demand inspection by Oracle

Platinum Sponsor

The Legal Bits


• Oracle’s entire license structure is to protect Oracle’s entire software enterprise from miss-use

• Oracle doesn’t have to grant a license to the customer for each software or update they provide you. Check your contract!

• Oracle maintains that you keep a log of instances per core and cluster for their viewing for a 2 year period

• Oracle claims that they have policies and guidelines to help customers understand their entitlement

• Experience shows that these documents are not fit for purpose• Oracles licensing metrics are a challenge and poorly communicated

Platinum Sponsor

The Golden Rules


• Oracle demands acknowledgement that YOU shall not expect to receive what was ordered

• YOU must first pay for an order before an invoice is submitted, however once payment is received there is no window of opportunity to make any corrections

• Ordering Document (generated and controlled by Oracle) has the final say• Oracle demands that in exchange for “significant savings” it extends to YOU,

YOU shall in turn permit Oracle to “refer to you as a customer” in any way• Specified order minimums can range in amounts far beyond YOUR needs. • There is no margin of error for unlicensed use of software.

Platinum Sponsor

Questions?


Technology

ITAM Review Oracle Seminar NY Levy LeGette Presentation