Software asset management (SAM) delivers numerous business benefits. The primary benefit being cost saving: Industry analysts estimate that savings from SAM can reach 30 percent in the first year and 5-10 percent annually in subsequent years.*

The benefits that you are deriving from SAM will be slightly different whether you are an IT Manager, Finance Manager or Managing Director. Below is a summary of the benefits you might enjoy:

IT Operational Benefits

• Increased accuracy of budgeting and reporting
  SAM enables organisations to accurately plan and budget for their software requirements, both new software, licence upgrades (or retirements) and particularly support requirements.

• Reduction of helpdesk incidents
  SAM enables organisations to reduce the number of calls from employees who need support on un-supported software. With SAM in place, the IT department can now identify and uninstall such software, stopping the problem before it starts. Consequently organisations can continue to support a growing IT user population with the same number of IT support staff.
• More efficient IT Operations
  The redeployment of support staff to higher value duties is a direct result of the reduced number of calls that the helpdesk has to deal with. This in turn improves staff morale as staff can now concentrate on keeping core operations running smoothly rather than the desktop.

Benefits to Finance Management

• Simplified Purchasing
  SAM enables greater transparency of software assets to the Finance department giving Purchasing more negotiation power to deal with software vendors.

• Volume Discounts
  Greater transparency of software assets also enables the Finance department to buy software in volume and receive further discounts from software vendors.

Benefits to Corporate Management

• Stronger Corporate Governance
  SAM enables organisations to better comply with government regulations

• Reduced liability
  SAM enables organisations and in particular Corporate Management to manage risks and mitigate liability. It enables Managing Directors to feel confident that they are compliant in their software usage and to reduce the incidence of over-licensing.

• Increased employee productivity
  With the proliferation of unsupported free software (such as ‘chat’ software) downloaded from the internet eliminated, General Management see an increase in staff productivity.

What is SAM?
SAM Goals
Implementing SAM in your organisation
How can Excitech help you implement a SAM program?

* “IT Asset Management: Moving to Higher Ground,” Frances O’Brien, Gartner ITAM Conference 2003.