If your enterprise is running Microsoft stack workloads that for whatever reason need to remain on-premises for the foreseeable future, Redmond has provided some additional assurance—for a price, naturally. Here are the details from an official blog post:
Today we are announcing the availability of Windows Server Premium Assurance and SQL Server Premium Assurance. With Windows Server Premium Assurance and SQL Server Premium Assurance, you receive critical and important security updates and bulletins for an additional six years after the end of Extended Support. This means you can get up to 16 years of total support, an extension from the usual five years each of Mainstream and Extended support.
These new offerings are designed to provide flexibility by enabling legacy applications to continue running without disruption as you modernize applications and infrastructure, or move to cloud. Some of the key benefits include:
Sustain critical and legacy applications for six additional years
Stay compliant with regulatory requirements
Maintain security on systems that may not be ready to update
The offer is aimed at companies facing certain scenarios, such as a legacy ERP system that's tied into many other systems, or custom apps that are running smoothly and would be costly to rewrite.
Microsoft is urging customers to buy the extended support plans sooner than later, saying that purchases made through June will provide up to 60 percent cost savings. The price goes up after that.
Redmond's ultimate goal is to draw more customer workloads to Azure; the availability of extended support could help keep more customers in the fold while giving them planning flexibility for the future.
Overall, there's nothing terribly new about this type of announcement, but the sliding rebate scale is innovative, says Constellation Research VP and principal analyst Holger Mueller.
"At the end of the day, giving customers choice is always a good thing," he adds. However, "fearmongering about end-of-life and locking customers in early with rebates into support and maintenance cointracts they may not need is not so good. We have to see how this pans out."
"Lastly, customers need to determine the need for support and maintenance," Mueller says. "Six years can be a long time to operate a technology product with no new capabilities and enhancements. This topic needs to be weighed in on in a sensible way."
Indeed, while Software Assurance gives Microsoft customers the right to new versions of Windows Server and SQL Server, just like any maintenance agreement, but the point may be moot since the offer is aimed at those who want to stay on older versions.
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