Software Licensing Metrics – Machine Compute Capacity

Welcome to this final article on software licensing metrics, we hope that you have found it both interesting and informative. In this last article we will be looking at Machine Compute Capacity as a license metric.

If we were to draw a comparison between this and the other metric that we have covered to which it is most similar – it would arguably be the performance metric. The reason for this is because the metric in this instance measures the potential capacity which the machine has to run the software, therefore making it suitable for software which has a performance and use capacity which is more directly related to the computing power of the computer or server upon which it is operating.

The Machine Compute Capacity metric literally measures the processing capacity of the machine; the size of its processors, how many it has and the maximum level of performance which it enables to software to deliver.

For example; if the software is used to organise a large image library, and one customer has a server with 2TB of space and 4GB and another has a server with the same amount of storage space but 8GB of RAM the latter will be able to see the benefits of the software more broadly as it will complete its tasks faster due to the higher processing power.

This is a highly flexible metric, and like the Physical Machine metric, enables a wide range of businesses to make use of it at an affordable price. It also allows for a relatively easy up-scaling of the capacity by the customer which can then be reported back to the vendor who can adjust their pricing accordingly. Put simply; if the customer upgrades the size of number of processors within the server that the software is being run on, then they will be charged more for their ongoing use of the software as they will be able to make better use of it.

As a vendor, this metric means that you can market to software to a wide variety of customers, all of whom will only pay for what they can use. This helps to maximise your profits by ensuring the widest possible customer base.

We hope that you have enjoyed this series on Software Licensing Metrics and that it has given you an insight into just how broad the range of possible metrics is! There is a metric to suit every vendor and every business. There is no longer any reason why software should not be affordable when customers are continuously paying in line with what they use, and can easily manage the cost of software licenses.

Image Credits: © Jeff Sheldon - unsplash.com