Licensing modes

A licensing mode is a scheme for accounting and billing for the use of services and their features. The licensing mode determines what units will be used as the base for pricing calculations. Licensing modes can be set by partners for their child partner or customer tenants.

While all licensing modes can be enabled for partner tenants, you can enable only one licensing mode per customer tenant.

The built-in licensing engine automatically acquires the offering items that a tenant uses, depending on which services are enabled for the tenant, what quotas are available for each service, and which features are requested in protection plans. Users can optimize the level of protection and cost by customizing their protection plans.

Licensing modes for the Protection service

The Protection service offers solution-based and service-based licensing modes.

Solution-based licensing (per workload)

Solution-based licensing is intended for small to medium-size Managed Service Providers (MSPs) who need easy-to-use packages of services that address the most commonly used services for cyber protection:

  • Security and RMM
  • Backup and Disaster Recovery
  • Ultimate Protection

The billing is done per workload. The use of cloud storage, where applicable, is billed separately. See the Licensing Guide in the Partner Portal

Service-based licensing (per workload/per gigabyte)

The feature set of both service-based licensing modes is identical, and the only difference is the unit used for billing.

  • In per workload licensing, the billing is based on the number of protected workload. Additional fees might apply for the used cloud storage.

  • In per gigabyte licensing mode, the billing is based on the used cloud and local storage.

In both modes, the Protection service includes Standard Protection features that cover the majority of cyber security risks. Users can use them at no additional charge. The use of standard features will be accounted, but not billed for. For a complete list of standard and additional services, see Standard and additional protection services.

When an additional service is enabled for a customer, billing will start only after the customer starts using the features of that service in a protection plan. When an additional service feature is applied in a protection plan, the licensing engine automatically assigns the required license to the protected workload.

When the additional service is no longer used, the license is revoked and the billing stops. The licensing engine assigns automatically the license that reflects the actual usage of the services.

You can assign licenses only for the standard Cyber Protect service features. Additional services are billed based on the usage and their licenses cannot be modified manually. The licensing engine assigns and unassigns these licenses automatically. You can change the license type for a workload manually, but it will be reassigned when the protection plan for that workload is modified by a user.

Licensing modes for File Sync & Share

File Sync & Share has the following licensing modes:

  • Per user

  • Per gigabyte

Both modes offer Notarization and eSignature as additional service.

The billing for the Notarization and eSignature service does not start when you enable it. Billing starts only after a customer starts using its features. The enabled service will be accounted for and included in usage reports, but will not be billed for, unless its features are used.

Billing for Physical Data Shipping

The billing for Physical Data Shipping follows the pay-as-you-go model.