ServiceNow, Snow, and Aspera Now Approved ILMT Substitutes for IBM Customers Under IASP

By way of background, IBM’s Authorized SAM Provider (IASP) initiative, announced by IBM nearly two years ago, provides a number of benefits to IBM customers who sign the IBM IASP agreement and are under a SAM managed service by one of the 4 globally-authorized IBM partner SAM providers (of which Anglepoint is one). These benefits include no audits by IBM, as well as other material commercial incentives. IBM’s stated intent with IBM IASP is to delight its software customers and provide them with a verification alternative. For more information on the initiative see our original post on IBM IASP.

All IBM customers who wish to benefit from sub-capacity pricing are required to deploy an IBM-approved sub-capacity reporting tool. Historically, IBM-approved tools were limited to the IBM License Metric Tool (ILMT), BigFix (now owned by HCL), Flexera One and Flexera (subject to pre-approval and execution of a special addendum).

Although IBM ILMT is provided by IBM free of charge, many customers have found the tool, not unlike other SAM tools on the market, to be challenging to deploy and configure correctly, even aside from the additional overhead inherent in having to run it alongside the customer’s other/main SAM tool (since IBM ILMT covers a subset of IBM software only).

IBM has just clarified to its IBM authorized SAM Providers that customers included in the IBM IASP offering may now also elect to use ServiceNow, Snow, or USU LiMa (previously known as Aspera )as an approved sub-capacity reporting tool subject to pre-approval from IBM. IBM is doing this because for customers under IBM IASP, who are receiving a managed service from an authorized SAM provider, IBM can have a higher level of confidence in the customer’s sub-capacity reporting. With this change, IBM now accepts, for customers under IBM IASP, any of the top four SAM tools as ranked by Gartner in their 2020 Magic Quadrant Report for SAM Tools.

This change significantly increases the number of SAM tools available to IBM customers under IBM IASP, allowing them more options to avoid having to run multiple tools in their environment and adding to the existing customer benefits in the IBM Authorized SAM Provider offering.

As the IBM IASP offering enters its 3rd year, it continues to evolve for the benefit of IBM customers. The transformation of IBM software licensing verification options appears to be genuine and consistent. In our experience, IBM’s Authorized SAM Provider Initiative is resonating in the global marketplace and is ready for adoption across a wide range of IBM software customers.

For more information, schedule to meet with us below or contact Anglepoint at IBM@anglepoint.com.