This next blog will touch on tips seven and eight – budget and forecast support costs and tracking the relationship between hardware and software support licenses.
Profitable businesses require the ability to forecast support costs across various timelines so they can plan projects appropriately. Without this ability, businesses struggle to forecast support costs accurately or in a reasonable amount of time. Therefore, you should provide asset line-level costs for current contracted products normalized to an annual or monthly period.
Be sure to track the relationship between hardware and software support licenses. You want to view individual support contracts with detailed information, based on real-time data. Then you can compare asset inventory support coverage across different manufacturers using generalized levels, compared across project, location, or application dimensions. Link hardware and software resources together to illustrate connections between software licensed to specific application environments.
Next is the last blog in the series and will discuss determining if and when to renew maintenance contracts and identifying and controlling asset information.
