Luton Borough Council and SCC

The Overview

Luton Borough Council faced the challenge of optimising usage of Microsoft 365 apps and improving the re-harvesting of unused licenses. SCC’s Cloud and Software Lifecycle Management Team were able to quickly identify challenges in the recycling of subscriptions for leavers and rightsizing users to the correct subscriptions based on their actual usage through Analysis using SCC’s Smarter SaaS for Microsoft 365.

Key Challenges

With an active base of over 2,500 users Luton Borough Council sought ways to optimise their M365 estate after the period of lockdowns and remote working increased the difficulty in identifying how users are working. Their aim was to identify where users not requiring the full extent of licenses purchased for them could utilise a different version of O365 and achieve a monetary saving as well as increasing the control over the re-assignment of licenses from users who have left the business.

Key Findings:

• Every user covered by the same O365 E3 license regardless of requirements
• Users not using full extent of O365 components available to them
• Nearly a third of all users not utilising Teams as expected
• Large number of licenses assigned to non user accounts with no registered usage

Key Benefits:

• Easy identification of leaver accounts to enable re-assigning of licenses
• Savings of over £32,000 a year through removal of unused licenses
• Further savings of over £49,000 a year identified on under utilised licenses
• Training identified for users to achieve full benefit of license

Key features of SCC’s Smarter SaaS process include:

• Identification and automated cost optimization
• Identification of usage levels by user
• Alignment of training and optimisation processes
• Automation of actions and adoption processes
• Measurement of usage improvements
• Ensure high levels of interactive working and ROI
• G-Cloud approved
• Microsoft approved ISV solution