IBM Software Helps Companies Discover and Eliminate Unnecessary IT Cost

IBM saves millions and poised to help customers do the same.

ARMONK, NY .- IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced software to help companies manage the costs brought on by the proliferation of IT assets such as mobile devices, laptops, printers, switches, sensors and billions of interconnected devices. The software also helps control the complexity of software licensing, and increased pace of compliance audits.

IBM’s IT Asset Management software allows business users to track and manage IT assets to help companies discover and eliminate overlapping and unnecessary IT costs. It also helps mitigate legal and financial risks by supporting regulatory and compliance requirements such as Sarbanes-Oxley.

“The new features of the Tivoli Asset Management for IT will give us additional insight into our software expense and usage,” said David Mitchell, ITAM Process Owner, United Space Alliance. “This will allow us to discover and eliminate overlapping and unnecessary IT costs.”

IBM’s CIO office projects software license reuse and audit exposure savings of US$3 million in 2009 and US$5 million annually beginning in 2010 after implementing a software license management program using IBM IT Asset Management software.

“By gaining greater visibility, control and automation of our IT assets, we expect to realize nearly $5 million in savings annually,” said Lorraine Herger, Director, Architecture and Strategy, IBM CIO Global Infrastructure.

The software offers special features focused on asset lifecycle management, software license management and audit readiness. These attributes help companies find and manage software inventory, as well as determine how and when software is used. This data is then linked to inventory, contract and procurement information, allowing companies to identify over- or under-licensing, which helps mitigate compliance risks and reduce IT costs.

IBM’s IT Asset Management software is designed to help enterprises gain a deeper visibility into the lifecycle of an IT asset – from planning to acquisition, deployment, management and retirement. This helps to maximize lifetime productive value of IT assets while helping organizations reduce IT costs, improve service, and align IT with business requirements.

Additional changes to IBM’s IT Asset Management software portfolio enhances the discovery of software inventory and software use for both distributed and mainframe environments.

Tivoli Asset Management for IT 7.2 has full support for Software License Management in addition to asset lifecycle management capabilities. The software helps identify under or over licensed software to reduce costs due to over-purchasing, helps maintain audit readiness and reduce compliance risk due to under-purchasing.

Tivoli Asset Discovery for z/OS 7.2 provides discovery and identification services for the z/OS platform. The software features include monitoring and reporting of the company’s software usage and trends.

Tivoli Asset Discovery for Distributed 7.2 features new discovery and identification services for distributed platforms and provides license usage for virtual environments including VMWare, as well as reporting for inventory and usage.

IBM License Metric Tool 7.2 is a no-charge utility, that helps IBM clients determine their full and sub-capacity processor value unit (PVU) licensing requirements. It is designed to help maintain an up-to-date inventory and achieve and maintain compliance with IBM Passport Advantage PVU-based software licensing.

“The new capabilities of IBM’s IT Asset Management software portfolio provides companies with the data they need to help make intelligent business decisions for maximizing their IT costs,” said Al Zollar, general manager of Tivoli software, IBM. “The software helps our customers manage the complexity of the billions of connected devices, so we can build dynamic infrastructures where organizations can respond to changes as quickly as they occur.”

Tivoli Asset Management for IT 7.2, Tivoli Asset Discovery for Distributed 7.2, IBM License Metric Tool 7.2 and Tivoli Asset Discovery for z/OS 7.2 are available now.