Ten years ago, lululemon athletica, a yoga-inspired athletic apparel and accessories company, had just one store. Today, this Vancouver-based company has over 80 locations across Canada, the U.S., Australia and Japan. As a result of its steady growth, the company recently chose Buchanan Associates Canada, an IT professional service, consulting and outsourcing company and also a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, to implement a software asset management (SAM) program.Ten years ago, lululemon athletica, a yoga-inspired athletic apparel and accessories company, had just one store.
Today, this Vancouver-based company has over 80 locations across Canada, the U.S., Australia and Japan. As a result of its steady growth, the company recently chose Buchanan Associates Canada, an IT professional service, consulting and outsourcing company and also a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, to implement a software asset management (SAM) program.
Mike Flood, lululemon’s CFO, said because the business had evolved from small to large over a relatively short period of time, lululemon needed a SAM solution that would help IT administrators and executives keep a better eye on the company’s software and licenses.
Having a SAM solution and strategy helps businesses better track their software assets throughout their lifecycle by matching software licenses to their respective software applications. This allows decision makers to see which upgrades and/or purchases are needed when it comes time to renew the software.
Other benefits to using a SAM solution include visibility into identifying what hardware and software a business already has, as well as determining who is using what and where by tracking what’s on the network.
“It’s important for us to be able to control what we’re doing so we found SAM was essential to us,” Flood said. “We see SAM as essential because of the financial, added-value and control aspects that are associated with it.”
After recognizing the need for a SAM solution, lululemon decided to sign an enterprise agreement with Microsoft Corp. to work with Mississauga, Ont.-based Buchanan Associates Canada to help it implement Microsoft’s System Center Configuration Manager (formerly known as Systems Management Server) 2007.
While the implementation process has not yet started, Flood said the company hopes to begin either sometime this month or the next.
Stephen Sweett, president of Buchanan Associates Canada, said before the implementation begins, an assessment must first be conducted to see what licenses and software the company already has in place.
“A lot of organizations don’t normally treat software as an asset,” Sweett said. “They don’t make it a big priority and so they don’t want to dedicate the resources to it. Based on the assessments we’ve done, the client may be over-licensed, they may have licenses in place they don’t even know about, or some may not even be licensed.”
Diana Piquette, license compliance manager for Microsoft Canada, said SAM should be a part of every company’s core strategy, regardless of the size of its business.“SAM optimizes your software investment because it reduces legal and business risks to make sure the software is compliant,” Piquette said.
“SAM saves money, optimizes software assets and also increases employee productivity and morale.”
System Center Configuration Manager 2007 is a software product that provides businesses with detailed reports that track exactly what software and hardware is on the network. With this capability, Flood said he hopes to have a better idea of where to redeploy unused software since he will know who is and isn’t using the software within the company.
“It will help save us money,” he said. “Like any other IT organization, what we’re looking towards doing is running our group on a shoestring. SAM lets us do this by being able to control our environment while at the same time helping us to minimize our costs.”
Sweett said one of the benefits to using System Center Configuration Manager is Sweett said one of the benefits to using System Center Configuration Manager is that it also automates procedures to help companies get software out faster.
“(System Center Configuration Manager will) show you where all the extra licenses are and then pull it back,” Flood said. “With the enterprise agreement, you’re paying for the product for three years and then for the software maintenance for the years following. You’re seeing savings with the redeployment of the software, with license agreements and by knowing everything that I have, that helps keep my costs low.”
Sweett said once a SAM solution is implemented within a company, management needs to ensure policies are put in place to maintain it. Once these guidelines are determined, Sweett said SAM should be able to govern itself since most of its features are automated.
With the enterprise agreement with Microsoft, Flood said lululemon currently has about 450 licenses for its desktops with Microsoft Windows and Office installed on all of them.
Other software lululemon is using includes Microsoft Visio, a diagramming software tool for Windows, Microsoft Office Professional Suites, Windows Server, SQL Server, Microsoft SharePoint, and more, Flood said.
“We’re looking forward to having a formal SAM plan to help us keep track of our inventory,” Flood said.
For other Microsoft partners, Piquette said the company encourages everyone to think about implementing a SAM solution.
“Just like we think every organization should have a SAM program, we think every partner should also care about SAM,” she said.
“We encourage our large account resellers and the rest of our reseller channel to understand SAM because if you’re going in and talking about security with a customer, how do you secure things if you don’t know what you have? SAM becomes that starting point for partners,” she added.