Share via

Rights Management Licensing Terms (for Orgs and ISVs)

  • Article

Happy Monday,

This is a cross-post from our TechNet RMS Blog, that we didn't want our developer audience to miss.

News tid-bit: Recently tweeted (follow @TheRMSGuy) a link to a cool YouTube video showing off RMS at the 200 level. It's perfect to share with your CSO or ITPro co-workers.  

As you all know by now, Microsoft Rights Management service (RMS) has released a significant update. Many of you have asked for details on the licensing terms... what's this going to cost me? Given I have X, do I need to get Y or not? etc. Here are the terms, grouped by organizational profile. This blog focuses on the Azure RMS service. The AD RMS service licensing terms remain unchanged. I do apologize for what may appear as duplicated text for those reading them all. As usual, let us know if you have questions. 

Office 365 -based Organization

  • Office 365 uses Azure RMS as the basis of its many information protection capabilities
  • Azure RMS is offered as a user subscription license
  • Each Azure RMS user subscription covers the use of any RMS-enlightened application.
  • When sharing with other organizations, their use of 'RMS for Individuals' (https://portal.aadrm.com) is free.
  • Consumption of rights protected content is free
  • A license is required to protect content.
    • Note that content protected 'on behalf of' a user also requires a license as that is considered protecting content. For example using SharePoint IRM-enabled document libraries and Exchange transport rules results in protecting files for many users; each of which requires an RMS license. We hope that you see this as being pretty logical -- Not having this clause would mean that Exchange would only need one license to perform DLP (data loss prevention) for a 200,000 person org. 
  • For smaller organizations, purchases of Azure RMS are done in the Office 365 portal
    • Office 365 E3/E4 and A3/A4 SKUs include capabilities from Azure RMS at no extra charge
    • Other Office 365 SKUs can use Azure RMS via an 'Add-On' (e.g.: K1, E1, A1, P1, P2)
    • Azure RMS can be paid for in monthly or annual terms (this last part is pending deployment but we will be adding it for convenience; to match the annual payment models available of parent SKUs such as E1). 
  • For larger organizations, purchases are made by contacting your Microsoft sales associate. Standalone Azure RMS is included in the November Price list for each of the Microsoft Enterprise Volume License programs (EA/EAS/EES).

 

On-Premises Organizations using Azure RMS

  • On-premises organizations can use Azure RMS (instead of a traditional ADRMS server)
  • On-premises versions of Exchange and SharePoint use the RMS Connector. The RMS connector use is included at no added charge.
  • Azure RMS is offered as a user subscription license.
    • Holders of an Core CAL access licenses seats should purchase Azure RMS via their enterprise agreement (EA) sales channel.
    • Holders of an ECAL (Enterprise Client) access licenses seats or RMS CAL seats should purchase a discounted 'Step-up' SKU to license Azure RMS. Azure RMS subscription rights include rights for use of AD RMS on-premises.
  • Each Azure RMS user subscription covers the use of any RMS-enlightened application.
  • When sharing with other organizations, their use of 'RMS for Individuals' (https://portal.aadrm.com) is free.
  • Consumption of rights protected content is free
  • A license is required to protect content.
    • Note that content protected 'on behalf of' a user also requires a license as that is considered protecting content. For example using SharePoint IRM-enabled document libraries and Exchange transport rules results in protecting files for many users; each of which requires an RMS license. We hope that you see this as being pretty logical -- Not having this clause would mean that Exchange would only need one license to perform DLP (data loss prevention) for a 200,000 person org. 
  • For smaller organizations, purchases are made by visiting the Office 365 portal. A Standalone Azure RMS offer can now be purchased independently of Office 365.
  • For larger organizations, purchases are made by contacting your Microsoft sales associate. Standalone Azure RMS is included in the November Price list for each of the Microsoft Enterprise Volume License programs (EA/EAS/EES).

 

Solution Partners

Solutions partners find themselves needing to perform protection operations on data for other organizations. In these use cases, the solution partner asks their customers to bring their own licenses (BYOL) as part of their Azure Active Directory configuration. We do things this way given the above terms outline a model where an organization pays only once for the right "to use RMS with any enlightened application or service".

For example, let's say a CAD company builds a virtual 'Construction meeting room' for 3 organizations to collaborate. The files are protected by the CAD company for the use of the other organizations. In this case the CAD firm is permitted to protect the files 'on behalf' of the other organizations using an instance of the Azure RMS service. They simply require that every user from each of these other organizations purchase licenses for all of their users visiting this meeting room. As you look at implementing this offering, please be sure to contact us at AskIPTeam@microsoft.com to discuss your specific use pattern. This pattern would apply to most 'virtual meeting room' type services. We thought you'd like this one... after all, what better of a price than free!. 

Also note that there is no 'mega solution offer' model where a partner acts as the RMS server for many companies (or many virtual rooms). Though possible today with SPLA ADRMS licensing terms, it's highly ill advised as the same RMS root security key would be protecting data for different organizations. Each virtual room should be a different Azure RMS tenant with its own root security key. This way important actions such as retiring a Azure RMS subscription have the expected effect of killing all remaining protected content. Again, as you look at implementing RMS in your service, please be sure to contact us at AskIPTeam@microsoft.com to discuss your specific use pattern. 

 

If you have any specific questions please contact your Microsoft sales associate. They'll help you out, or they'll know where to find us. If you prefer to ask us directly then send the question(s) to AskIPTeam@microsoft.com but please CC your Microsoft sales contact. 

Cheers,

   Dan on behalf of the RMS team