Engineering license management

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 1, 2024
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Engineering license management

    Engineering license management in ServiceNow provides visibility into license position and usage for engineering applications, helping to reduce audit risks, optimize license utilization, improve forecasting accuracy, and prevent license denials. This capability supports industries such as aerospace, oil and gas, and construction by managing shared concurrent licenses via license management servers.

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    Concurrent licenses allow multiple users to share software access from any networked computer or virtual machine, with license management servers controlling the distribution and availability of licenses in a shared pool. When an application requests a license, the server grants it if available, and the license returns to the pool upon application exit.

    Key Features

    • Support for three license types: floating, network, and token licenses.
    • Integration with OpenLM and Open iT, industry-standard license monitoring tools, which connect to various license management servers (e.g., IBM LUM, Sentinel Technologies, Bentley Systems).
    • Data collection from license management servers through OpenLM and Open iT, which consolidates, normalizes, and reconciles license usage data into the ServiceNow instance.
    • Dashboards available in both Software Asset Management classic application and Software Asset Workspace, showing metrics such as total software spend, license denials, usage trends, and user activity.
    • Plugin requirement: To access full Software Asset Management Professional capabilities for engineering applications, customers must request the specific plugin (com.snsampengapp).

    Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    • Centralized visibility into engineering software license consumption and availability to mitigate compliance risks and optimize costs.
    • Automated and accurate data collection from diverse license management systems, reducing manual effort and errors.
    • Insightful reporting and dashboards to monitor license usage, identify denials, and enable proactive license allocation.
    • Improved forecasting and planning capabilities to avoid license shortages or over-provisioning.
    • Seamless integration with existing license management infrastructure via OpenLM and Open iT, leveraging their extensive server support.

    Next Steps

    To implement engineering license management, request the Software Asset Management Professional for Engineering Applications plugin, download and configure the OpenLM or Open iT Store applications, and complete their setup via Guided Setup. For detailed configuration guidance, refer to the respective documentation available on the ServiceNow Store for OpenLM Adapter Integration and Open iT LicenseAnalyzer.

    Get visibility into your license position and usage of your engineering applications to eliminate audit risks, inefficient usage of licenses, inaccurate forecasting, and to help prevent denials.

    Watch this short video for an introduction to engineering license management.

    Note:
    To access all the benefits of the Software Asset Management Professional for engineering applications, request the Software Asset Management Professional for Engineering Applications plugin (com.sn_samp_eng_app). For more information, see Request Software Asset Management.

    Engineering applications refer to categorizing software products in industries such as aerospace, oil and gas, and construction.

    A concurrent license enables multiple users to share access to software applications from any computer on a network or from a virtual machine. License management servers that are installed on the network manage the distribution of a pool of shared licenses.

    You can have multiple license management servers; one for each engineering application. The number of concurrent licenses in the shared pool determines the number of users who can use the software application at a given time. When you want to use an application, that application sends a request to the appropriate license management server to determine if a license is available. If a license is available, the application starts and the number of available licenses decreases by one. When the user exits the application, the license returns to the pool.

    The following graphic illustrates the way OpenLM and Open iT work with the ServiceNow instance.

    Engineering License Manager

    The Software Asset Management application supports three types of licenses: floating, network, and token licenses. For information on these licenses, see Software license metrics.

    The ServiceNow instance integrates with OpenLM and Open iT to collect data from license management servers. OpenLM and Open iT are software license monitoring and management tools that integrate with a wide variety of license management servers such as IBM License Use Management (LUM), Sentinel Technologies, and Bentley Systems, Inc. Both OpenLM and Open iT connect with each license management server, consolidate the data, and get the data into your ServiceNow instance via the ServiceNow Store application.

    After you download the ServiceNow Store application and configure the application via Guided Setup, both OpenLM and Open iT trigger data collection from all the license management servers that are connected to either of these. Data such as license usage, denials, user activity, and alerts are collected from the license management servers by OpenLM and Open iT, and transferred to the ServiceNow instance. The data is normalized and reconciled to produce reports. You can see the total spend on engineering software, the most denied products, license usage over time, and many other reports on the Engineering License Overview dashboard (Software Asset Management classic application) or the Engineering License overview dashboard in workspace (Software Asset Workspace).
    Important:
    For more details on the OpenLM setup and configuration, refer to the Supporting Links and Docs section of the OpenLM Adapter Integration page in the ServiceNow Store.

    For more details on the Open iT setup and configuration, refer to the Open iT LicenseAnalyzerpage in the ServiceNow Store.