Month: April 2023

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Microsoft Defender gets App Governance included for free


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Microsoft have announced that the “App Governance add-on feature for Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps” will, from June 1 2023, be included in Defender for Cloud Apps at no additional cost.

This means organisations licensed with:

  • Microsoft 365 E5
  • Microsoft 365 E5 Security/Compliance
  • Microsoft 365 F5
  • EMS E5

will receive access to what is currently a paid additional license free of charge. It’s not very often that Microsoft (or any software publisher) do things this way round!

Microsoft say they will either proactively cancel subscriptions or do so upon receiving a ticket, depending on the licensing channel.

Microsoft announcement is here.

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Microsoft Windows 365 Frontline


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Windows 365 Frontline is a new licensing option for Microsoft’s Cloud PC offering, aimed at “Frontline” workers who don’t need constant access to their own PC. This can be scenarios such as:

  • Staff on rota
  • Staff across timezones
  • Part-time staff

Licensing

Each W365 Frontline license allows 3 Cloud PCs virtual machines to be provisioned, but they cannot be used concurrently. The maximum active number of Frontline VMs allowed is equal to the number of licenses you’ve purchased i.e. you’ve bought 20 licenses which enables 60 VMs…but only 20 can be in use at any one time.

W365 Frontline introduces the concept of concurrent licensing – rather than licensing ever shift worker, you instead buy enough licenses to cover the maximum number of desktops active at any one time. For example, 300 users who work in 3 shifts of 100 users = 100 licenses needed.

From a management perspective, the licenses will not show as assigned to users (as they are applied at the tenant level) so you will need to use the W365 utilization report to see how many licenses are being used.

Learn more here – https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-365/enterprise/introduction-windows-365-frontline and https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2023/04/06/windows-365-offers-flexibility-from-the-office-or-home-to-the-frontline/

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Microsoft 365 Universal Print allowance


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Microsoft Universal Print is a cloud printing service that removes the need for on-premises print servers and printer drivers and makes printing from anywhere easier for users and organisations.

Previously, each user licenses with Windows E3 received 5 print jobs per month which were added to a central pool. Microsoft have now added an allowance of 100 print jobs per month for Microsoft 365 E3/E5 users:

LicenseJobs Per Month
Microsoft 365 E3, E5100
Microsoft 365 A3, A5, F3, Business Premium5
Windows 10 Enterprise E3, E5, A3, A55
Universal Print (standalone)5

If you have 1,000 M365 E3/E5 licenses, you now have 100,000 print jobs available each month. For organisations where this pooled allowance isn’t enough, additional print jobs can be purchased:

QuantityPriceEDU Discount (and Price)
500 jobs$25/mo$7.50/mo
10,000 jobs$300/mo$90/mo

The standalone license is $4 per user per month.

Learn more about Universal Print here – https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-it-pro-blog/universal-print-or-unlimited-print/ba-p/3788180

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Microsoft Defender Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)


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Microsoft have introduced another member of the Defender family – Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM).

Certain features are available free of charge in any environment where Defender for Cloud is enabled, these include:

  • Asset discovery
  • Security recommendations & compliance with Microsoft benchmarks
  • Secure score for posture

Paid features include:

  • Attack path analysis
  • Cloud security explorer
  • Advanced threat hunting

and more.

Pricing

Defender CSPM protects all workloads across multi-cloud environments but is only chargeable for Server, Database, and Storage resources including:

  • VMs
  • Storage accounts
  • OSS DBs
  • SQL PaaS
  • SQL Servers

Pricing starts from May 1, 2023 and is $5* per billable resource per month but there are discounts available for Defender for Cloud customers:

Current Defender for Cloud CustomerAutomatic DiscountDefender CSPM Price
Defender for Servers P225%$11.25/ Compute or Data workload / month
Defender for Containers10%$13.50/ Compute or Data workload / month
Defender for DBs / Defender for Storage5%$14.25/ Compute or Data workload / month

*Pricing was initially announced as $15 per billable resource per month but was later reduced to $5. It also appears the above discount structure has been removed.

For more info and to see a complete list of free/paid features, head to the Microsoft site here – https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/defender-for-cloud/concept-cloud-security-posture-management#plan-pricing

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Microsoft Product Terms: April 2023


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It’s the Microsoft Product Terms updates for April 2023 and, to paraphrase Puff Daddy and the Bad Boy Family…it’s all about Windows Server baby!

Some key changes that help to harmonise licensing across different platforms, which is a benefit for all of us involved!

Azure Hybrid Benefit for Windows Server changes:

No longer need to allocate 16 licenses as a minimum
No longer have to assign stacked licenses in groups of 8
Confirms minimum of 8 core licenses for AHB VM

Licensing Win Svr by individual virtual OSE:

No longer need to allocate 16 licenses as a minimum
CSP customers with Standard licenses can use Datacenter images as guests when licensing by virtual OSE – but must follow Standard edition use rights

CSP-Hoster:

Customers do not need Windows Server CALs or External Connector licenses when accessing “server software acquired from, fulfilled, and hosted by a Cloud Solution Provider-Hoster”.

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