SoftwareOne case study
SoftwareOne helps Bane NOR achieve optimal licensing and infrastructure
When Bane NOR stepped up its IT efforts a few years ago, it was natural to partner with SoftwareOne (formerly Crayon) for collaboration on software licenses. “Stable and secure IT operations are necessary to fulfil our social mission, and IT software procurement and management are fundamental for us,” says Erik Nygård, License and Asset Manager at Bane NOR.
Bane NOR is a state-owned entity tasked with overseeing Norway's national railway infrastructure. The company is dedicated to the management, maintenance, and development of railway tracks, signaling systems, and stations across Norway.
Headquartered in Oslo, Bane NOR operates nationwide, encompassing sophisticated IT operations. Following its merger with Spordrift, the organization now boasts a workforce of nearly 5,000 employees, with approximately 600 of them specializing in IT.
“We are completely dependent on collaborating with skilled advisors. SoftwareOne has supported us with everything from strategic advice and facilitation around software procurement to operational license management assistance through hired consultants.
“The most important thing for us is that SoftwareOne is a partner, not just a supplier selling us products,” he adds.
Getting to grips with license management
Like other major corporations, Bane NOR manages a substantial portfolio of software licenses and has high levels of Azure consumption, along with the associated costs. A primary challenge has been to streamline and control license management.
“One of SoftwareOne's most important tasks is to ensure that we are always correctly licensed, as well as having an optimized environment where we do not pay more than necessary,” says Nygård.
A key component was SoftwareOne’s Software Economics service. This includes conducting periodic reviews of software licenses within the Bane NOR software portfolio. Such reviews entail comparing the owned software licenses against the actual usage of products from various software manufacturers.
The comprehensive report generated from this review highlights critical aspects: current license utilization, potential risks stemming from non-compliance, opportunities for optimization, and recommended actions for enhancing license management practices.
Nygård highlights how important it is to have a partner like SoftwareOne during a license review, at a time when manufacturers, have increased their rates for licensing software.
- Client
- Bane NOR
- Industry
- Transportation
- Platform
- Azure Cloud
- Services
- Publisher Advisory Services
- Country
- Norway
Strategic SAM advisory
He comments: “As a buyer of licenses, we come across a lot of anomalies. Thankfully as SoftwareOne has been doing this for many years and has deep license contract knowledge across vendors such as Microsoft, AWS, Oracle, and IBM, it knows all the tricks that suppliers use. It is very useful to have a professional teammate in such negotiations. It’s like they are sitting on my side of the table!”
Nygård specifically highlights SoftwareOne's role in Bane NOR’s managing its Snow Software’s Software Asset Management (SAM) solution. SoftwareOne carried out tasks such as order processing, and license agreement administration - from entering new contracts to updating existing ones in Snow License Manager as well as taking a SAM baseline review.
“I would like to point out that SoftwareOne has been on the ball here. Following best practices its consultants came up with strategic advice, proactive suggestions, and suggested alternative ways of licensing software of which we were not aware,” says Nygård.
For its Azure consumption, SoftwareOne carried out an Azure analysis to identify cost savings and optimization opportunities in the cloud. Now Bane NOR receives dynamic Power BI reports and dashboards that provide a detailed overview of Azure consumption, allowing for easy analysis of consumption across various parameters, including which parts of the organization are responsible for the consumption.
Additionally, Bane NOR gets a detailed status report with insights and recommendations for optimizing usage based on the analysis and collected data.
Nygård concludes, “I believe SoftwareOne is a strategic SAM advisor who has carried out strategic and operational activities for us. We really count on SoftwareOne consultants to act as our contact point for dialogue between us and our suppliers and software vendors.”
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