Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central Licensing Guide - full news and Q&A from Directions EMEA 2018
Alexander Ermakov
28,094
Like
Share
ReportDespite recent Directions US conference, where most of the news were revealed, licensing topics were still hot on Directions EMEA. Awara IT as usual is visiting the biggest Dynamics NAV and Business Central conference in the world. Here is a wrap-up of latest licensing news and results of Q&A licensing sessions in
The Haague this fall.
Dynamics 365 Business Central general licensing concepts
Named user concept. Named CALs are assigned on a “named user” basis, meaning each user requires a separate User License. Named user licenses cannot be shared but an individual with a named user license may access the service through multiple devices.
Three types of Dynamics 365 Business Central licenses:
- Team member (reads and approves, creates cards, quotes and sales orders)
- Essential (all except service management and manufacturing)
- Premium (all including service management and manufacturing)
- One external free license for accountant
- One external free license for administrator
Dynamics 365 Business Central SaaS (cloud) licensing
Here is the link to official licensing guide: https://mbs.microsoft.com/partnersource/global/pricing-ordering/licensing-policies/Dyn365BusinessCentralPricingLicensing
- CSP is the only method to license Dynamics 365 Business Central cloud license.
- Device CALs.
- Named user concept.
- Annual or monthly billing.
- Trials available.
- ISV Team Member available.
- No storage limitations (as in case of Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations); despite the fact that it aims to move to CCS/CDM, there is still no storage limitations for cloud.
At least, one Essential or Premium user needs to be licensed.
Additional objects are free:
- Objects in 70,000,000 – 75,000,000 range are given by vendor for free when registering App in the AppSource – inherited from “Business Edition”, works only in cloud.
- Objects in 1,000,000 – 60,000,000 range are given by vendor for free for ISV partner solutions (should match ISV requirements); will be available for both on-premises and cloud versions of Business Central and will have possibility to be published in AppSource (not yet, but soon).
- Objects in 50,000 – 99,999 range are given by vendor for free and could be used to deploy on-premises extensions per tenant, cannot be used in AppSource, but can be uploaded directly to a tenant
By default, Business Central on-prem sandbox is deployed with Essentials type of user license. There would be no manufacturing features by that. However you can activate premium functionality and enable manufacturing, using this official guide:
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/freddyk/2018/04/12/enabling-premium-experience-in-business-central-sandbox-containers/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/freddyk/2018/04/12/enabling-premium-experience-in-business-central-sandbox-containers/
Cloud Transition Promo in place when upgrading from on-premises installations to SaaS cloud installation: for existing active customers (active before March 2018) 40% discount for cloud offering if they convert before June 30, 2021; if more users purchased after transition, 40% discount will be applied for those as well.
Dual Use Rights – available only through SaaS cloud licensing offering. The customer who uses SaaS version can download license key (.flf format) from Customer Source selecting “My Products and Services” link from the dropdown menu and then clicking on the “registration Keys” link beside the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central product.
Dynamics 365 Business Central On-Premises licensing
New BREP options appeared. Apart from usual 16% Enhancement Plan, there are also 18% Advantage Plan and 25% Advantage Plus Plan, as well as 25% Software Assurance and Premier Support options to offer better SLAs for incidents resolution and more access to support features (see the DPL price policy above for full details).
Here is the link to official licensing guide: https://mbs.microsoft.com/partnersource/northamerica/pricing-ordering/price-sheets/dynNAVpricesheet
Perpetual Licensing
NAV 2018 licenses for new customers will be sold until December 31, 2018; from January, 01 no new customer license sale of NAV 2018. Customers that target NAV should purchase Business Central on-premises.
Named user concept. Only DPL (Dynamics Price List) method to license on-premises perpetual licenses. No Starter Pack needed, minimum one Premium or Essential user is required.
For transition you need to make an order at Order Central (for NAV 2018 without Extended Pack) or through Regional Operations Center (for NAV 2018 ? Extended pack and NAV 2018).
All perpetual-licensed types of customers with older versions (NAV 2018 and older) that were active (that is, had licenses and active BREP) before October, 01 2018:
- Can continue using their products as they are and purchase additional licenses and objects; there is no date limiting the usage unless they pay active BREP
- With version older than NAV 2018 (e.g., Navision 5.0), will be able to upgrade to newer older versions (e.g., to NAV 2018) not later than April 01, 2019; after April 01, 2019 they will be able to upgrade only to Dynamics 365 Business Central without downgrade option (obviously as it implies different licensing concepts of named users).
- Will be able to upgrade to Dynamics 365 Business Central perpetual anytime, with concurrent users to be converted to named users:
- One Full User (Extended Pack) – to two Premium users
- One Full User (no Extended Pack) – to two Essential users
- One Limited User – to one (!) Team Member
- Objects – as they are
- The total value of licenses remains the same. E.g., if there has been 10 perpetual licenses of total 10,000 USD, then they will be converted to 10 named licenses of value 10,000 USD plus 10 extra named licenses with zero value; this total value will be used for the BREP calculation
- Upgrade from Essential to Premium will be available (still open), but not backwards
- Application Builder and Solution Developer are converted 1-to-1
All perpetual-licensed types of customers with older versions (e.g., NAV 2018) that became new customers (that is, had made the first purchase) after October, 01 2018:
- Can continue using their products as they are and purchase additional licenses and objects; there is no date limiting the usage unless they pay active BREP
- With version older than NAV 2018 (e.g., NAV 2017), will be able to upgrade to newer older versions (e.g., to NAV 2018) not later than April 01, 2019; after April 01, 2019 they will be able to upgrade only to Dynamics 365 Business Central without downgrade option (obviously as it implies different licensing concepts of named users)
- Will be able to upgrade to Dynamics 365 Business Central perpetual anytime, with concurrent users to be converted to named users:
- One Full User (Extended Pack) – to one Premium users
- One Full User (no Extended Pack) – to one Essential users
- One Limited User – to one Team Member
- Objects – as they are
- The total value of licenses remains the same. E.g., if there has been 10 perpetual licenses of total 10,000 USD, then they will be converted to 10 named licenses of value 10,000 USD
- Upgrade from Essential to Premium will be available (still open), but not backwards
No mix and match between Essential and Premium – only one type for all users is allowed.
Subscription licensing
Named user concept. Only DPL (Dynamics Price List) method to license on-premises subscription licenses.
All subscription-licensed types of customers with older versions (NAV 2018 and older) that are active (that is, had licenses and active subscription):
- Can continue using their products as they are and purchase additional licenses and objects.
- Starting from October 01, 2019 the subscription prices will be increased by around 20-30%
- Will be able to upgrade to Dynamics 365 Business Central on-premises anytime, skipping the current subscription and starting paying for the new subscription
- If placed in Azure, there will be extra license discount of 20% for subscription of licenses, both now and after October 01, 2019.
"Discuntinued" one the slide above is not that much correct, as it means only increase of the price (so NAV 2018 subscription can be continued for existing customers, but at a higher price.
Extra questions and scenarios
Q: There is a multi-national company with separate installations in different countries, properly licensed. There are people from head office that need to have access to all the databases in all countries, which they did using concurrent licensing. Does this mean they now need to have a named license for each of them in each of those databases?
A: Currently, yes. They need to have separate named license in each database for each user. There might be a change in the future to decrease cost of that scenario, but so far it is so. Potential workaround: those people could access databases as external accountants which is one free license per database.
Q: There are 100 concurrent users licensed, but overall there are 500 users accessing the system at different time (no multiplexing involved). Conversion of 1-to-2 would give only 200 named users, should 300 named users licenses be purchased extra?
A: Currently, yes. There will be extra cost in this scenario. There might be a change in the future to decrease the cost of this scenario, but so far it is so. There is no clear workaround for that.
A: Currently, yes. There will be extra cost in this scenario. There might be a change in the future to decrease the cost of this scenario, but so far it is so. There is no clear workaround for that.
Q: When named license is assigned to user, what happens if he leaves the company? Is there a tool to de-assign and assign this license to new user?
A: Currently there is no tool to manage user licenses – neither on partner, nor on customer level. So far it should be managed manually by Microsoft upon request, but product team is working over a tool that should be similar to what Office 365 offers.
A: Currently there is no tool to manage user licenses – neither on partner, nor on customer level. So far it should be managed manually by Microsoft upon request, but product team is working over a tool that should be similar to what Office 365 offers.
Q: Are Cloud Team Members and On-Premises Team Members harmonized in terms of functionality?
A: No, On-Premises Team Member has different functionality. E.g., it can modify to up to 45 custom range tables. Customers moving to the cloud can loose some functionality of team member.
A: No, On-Premises Team Member has different functionality. E.g., it can modify to up to 45 custom range tables. Customers moving to the cloud can loose some functionality of team member.
Q: If customer has a standard perpetual license of NAV 2018 before October 01, 2018, but he wants to have Extended functionality, can he first upgrade to Extended NAV 2018 and then convert it to Premium users of Business Central?
A: Yes, customer can take those actions that would be economically beneficial for him - he can first upgrade to Extended NAV 2018 and then convert to Premium Business Central in the proportion of 1 to 2, or just convert to Business Central Essential and then upgrade to Premium.
Q: Is there any plan to bundle Dynamics 365 Business Central licenses with other Microsoft offerings, e.g. CRM products?
A: Yes, definitely, we are working on that now.
Q: Server farms question. There is a limitation for having more than two server farms (e.g., production and disaster recovery) with the time zone not more than 4 hours difference. How this makes sense with the new concept of named user license?
A: Yes, there is not much sense in that now. We will study that.
Q: How partners can keep track how many named users customers might have, specifically for ISV solutions?
A: There is no telemetry for that so far.
Q: Can customers that were active before October 01, 2018, but with other products (e.g., GP or AX) also convert to Dynamics 365 Business Central?
A: Yes.
Q: Can licenses be moved between affiliated companies?
A: Yes, there is no change in that policy.
Q: If customer has made a first purchase before October 01, 2018, and was an active customer, and upgraded to NAV 2018 after October 01, 2018, will he still have the 1-to-2 conversion option?
A: Yes, the only relevant is when he made the first purchase and was he active with BREP.
Q: Can Team member write to extension table behind the AppSource?
A: No, Essentials is needed for that.
Q: Any plans to limit the total number of users?
A: No plans for that limitations. For Business Edition there has been some "guarantee" for 250 users, but it is not applicable for Business Central anymore.
More information at the Partner Readiness portal: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/business-central/dev-itpro/developer/readiness/readiness-welcome
Comments
-
Speaking about Saas Env, does anyone have information about performance? If our Business required a lot of resource and our customer found the application slow how could I improve the performance if Microsoft'll manage the systems? Ok for no storage limitations but what about computational limitations?? I would not find a slow environment after with nothing to do...
-
-
*This post is locked for comments