Discount-Licensing Limited Blog

Whether you are looking to upgrade your office suite or simply maintaining compliance the cost of software licensing can be expensive. A conventional Microsoft reseller will automatically tell you that the most cost-effective way to licence your business correctly is to buy Office 365 or Azure and move away from on-premise perpetual licensing to a subscription cloud-based solution.

At Discount Licensing, we buy and sell pre-owned, perpetual software licences, working closely with a variety of large businesses across Europe. Trading in your surplus software licences or purchasing pre-owned ones can help you save a significant amount of money for your business.

Pre-owned, perpetual software licences can offer excellent value to a business looking to maximise its savings. When it comes to perpetual software licence resellers, they must abide by the Software Directive 2009.

IT giant Microsoft has been making headlines for the wrong reasons recently, after a new report has revealed that some 250 million of its customer records – spanning 14 years – have been exposed for all to see online without password protection.

The second-hand software market is booming as more and more businesses come to understand what an effective way it is to save money. Very few businesses don’t require some software to operate effectively while most are always looking for ways to save money without affecting operational performance. That’s what pre-owned software offers, effective software for a lot less money!

If you have redundant Microsoft software licences that are sitting around doing nothing for your business, one of the best options available to you is to sell them. Doing so allows you to release your invested capital back into your business, presenting you with the opportunity to reinvest that money where it is really needed. Many Discount Licensing clients redirect the funds raised from selling Microsoft software licences into other IT projects.

Many people liken pre-owned software to second-hand objects, assuming that there will be signs of usage - but this isn’t true. Pre-owned software is as good as new with every fresh install. There are no mechanical aspects and there are no moving parts, so there is no way to “wear out” a piece of software. As long as software is installed on the appropriate hardware, it will be as responsive, usable, and suitable for your business as ever – even if it has been used before.

This article was written by Rich Gibbons of ITAM Review and Noel Unwin of Discount Licensing.

In July 2012, the second-hand software market received a definitive answer from the European Court of Justice (ECJ) when it ruled that reselling intangible software was legal. The rights of the software vendor to control the resale of the software copy is ‘exhausted’ after the first sale of the copy (Exhaustion Principle). This precedent is encapsulated within the European Software Directive 2009.

Short answer: no. Buying and selling used software is now legally protected in Europe following the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling back in 2012 which enabled businesses to legally sell their disused software licence assets. The most important factor to bear in mind when purchasing used software licences is to use a reputable secondary reseller that can provide your business with the unique perpetual software licence agreement number (identifying the original Microsoft customer) and ownership documents. Perpetual used software does not expire or need renewing and will continue to be supported by the vendor in exactly the same way as new software licence customer enjoy. Unlike with the Cloud, used software businesses do not have to renew/install the latest software version when launched – used software clients can maintain a previous version of the software on its network.

If you're buying new equipment or software for your business, you may have considered pre-owned software as an alternative to buying a brand new software at the full price. After all, that reduction in cost can make expensive Microsoft software more affordable to any business that wants to stretch its IT budget. But when you choose to buy pre-owned software, will your business be limited to what it can do in comparison to buying new? Read on to find out more…

When setting out to acquire new software solutions for your business, it can be tempting to save money by opting for used software. You could purchase a fresh licence directly from Microsoft, or you could purchase a second-hand licence from a reseller - perhaps even from eBay! There are advantages and disadvantages to each option, so it is important to be aware of all the facts before making a decision about which way to go. Here we compare the option of buying new against buying second hand - which is right for you?