Insights for IT Negotiations: Recent Episodes
UpperEdge
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Oracle reported a great quarter, with their stock price up over 13%. A significant amount of their growth this quarter was cloud related, with their cloud revenue up over 23%. Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) revenue was also up 53%. Going forward, Oracle forecasts a tremendous amount of increase, including OCI growth at over 50% and total revenue growth at a double-digit rate. In this podcast, our Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, highlights some key growth opportunities for Oracle, including AI and cloud opportunities. He also breaks down how Oracle customers can use the vendor’s clear goals as leverage in their upcoming negotiations. For a more in depth discussion on how to evaluate and negotiate OCI, register for next week’s webinar here > https://upperedge.com/knowledge-center/webinars/event/unraveling-oracles-oci-and-universal-credit-model/Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdNOracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Workday reported a strong quarter, with their revenue up 17% from the prior quarter and 18% year-over-year. However, this revenue is still down from the 20% growth they were experiencing in prior years. As a result, they have lowered their projection numbers for the remainder of the year. Workday is citing scrutiny on how money is being allocated for net new deals, something we are seeing happening across all software vendors. Customers are weary to take on larger transformation project and larger investments, especially when there is a lot of uncertainty in the market. Headcount growth was also cited as a reason for their lowered projection numbers. In this podcast, Workday Practice Leader Jeff Lazarto gives a high-level overview of the recent earnings results. He also maps out what to expect from Workday in the coming quarters as they try to accelerate revenue growth, especially for those clients in the public services, healthcare, and financial services industries. Lastly, he covers how customers can prepare for their upcoming Workday negotiations and renewals given this information.Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdNWorkday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Salesforce’s Q1 FY25 total revenue came in at $9.13B, representing an 11% growth year-over-year. This was on the lower end of their guided range and came up short of the analyst expected $9.17B. Salesforce now expects their FY25 subscription and support revenue growth to come in slightly below 10% (Salesforce’s better way of saying single digit). Elongated deal cycles, deal compression, and high levels of budget scrutiny have been cited as the driving factors to the slowed growth. It is clear from the earnings call that Salesforce, and the Salesforce account executives, need to turn things around; your Saleforce reps will be focused on getting customers to adopt Data Cloud and their GenAI offering, Einstein Copilot. They will also be leaning on price and packaging changes to drive revenue growth as well. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what Salesforce’s earnings mean for customers and what customers should expect from Salesforce as they push through their upcoming negotiations, whether in term or at renewal. In addition, Adam provides his perspective on how best to prepare for Salesforce’s aggressive push to upsell and cross sell their current customers. Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Microsoft announced their FY24 Q3 earnings yesterday. Total revenue was reported as $61.9B, better than the $60.9B analysts were expecting. The critically important Microsoft Cloud revenue, which includes Azure, O365 Commercial, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365 and other cloud products, came in at $35.1B, representing a 23% increase year-over-year. Microsoft’s Azure revenue grew 31% in the quarter, which is an acceleration from the prior quarter with 7 points coming from Microsoft’s AI services. Microsoft’s go-forward success and revenue growth will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft’s ability to get more customers to adopt cloud products, AI solutions (Copilot for Microsoft 365, Copilot for Sales, Copilot for Service, GitHub Copilot, and Azure OpenAI) and migrate to the costly all-in Microsoft 365 E5 suite. In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how customers can take advantage of Microsoft’s needs and focus areas to ensure the right deal is struck at the negotiation table. He also covers what enterprise customers should expect from Microsoft as they prepare for their in-term (“early renewal”) or renewal negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow’s Q1 FY24 subscription revenue came in at $2.523B, representing 25% growth year-over-year while also beating guidance and analyst expectations. ServiceNow also slightly raised their full year FY24 subscription revenue guidance, now expecting somewhere between $10.56B and $10.575B, which would represent 21.5 to 22% growth. In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as ServiceNow does everything it can to accelerate their GenAI product adoption (specifically ramping upgrades and adoption of “Pro Plus”) while also continuing to upsell and cross sell their current customers and adding net new logos. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Oracle’s Q3 2024 earnings call was released earlier this week, and it should come as no surprise that they continue to be laser-focused on the cloud. If you’re an existing or prospective Oracle customer, you can benefit from Oracle’s priorities in your upcoming negotiations. In this podcast, Oracle Practice Manager Shane Griffin gives a high-level overview of the recent earnings results and covers how customers can prepare for their upcoming Oracle negotiations and renewals given this information.Host: Shane Griffin: https://bit.ly/43ADl2VOracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Workday's FY24 revenue saw an impressive increase, with total revenue reaching $1.90 billion and marking a 17% year-over-year growth. This growth was slightly ahead of Workday’s target and supported by an increase in net-new customers, ongoing focus on the healthcare sector and early renewals. In this podcast, Workday Practice Manager Erwann Couesbot gives a high-level overview of the recent earnings results. He also maps out what to expect from Workday in the coming year as they continue to accelerate growth internally and in the healthcare, higher education, and government sectors. Lastly, he covers how customers can prepare for their upcoming Workday negotiations and renewals given this information.Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdXWorkday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2TTLjEO
Salesforce’s FY24 total revenue came in at $34.9B, representing an 11% growth year-over-year. However, this did come in much lower than the 18% growth posted in FY23. Salesforce’s FY25 guidance also represents a continued decline in growth, as the midpoint of Salesforce’s forecasted revenue would represent roughly 8.6% growth. It is clear from the earnings call that Salesforce, and the Salesforce account executives, will be focused on getting customers to adopt both Data Cloud and the newly released Einstein Copilot. Salesforce will be pushing Einstein Copilot either as an add-on to the current Sales Cloud and/or Service Cloud subscriptions or an upgrade to the most robust and expensive “Einstein 1” edition (formerly “Unlimited Plus”). An “Einstein 1” adoption or upgrade also inevitably comes with Data Cloud adoption. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what Salesforce’s earnings mean for customers and what customers should expect from Salesforce as they push through their upcoming negotiations, whether in term or at renewal. In addition, Adam provides his perspective on how best to prepare for Salesforce’s aggressive push to upsell and cross sell their current customers.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Microsoft announced their FY24 Q2 earnings yesterday. Total revenue was reported as $62B, better than the $61.1B analysts were expecting. The critically important Microsoft Cloud revenue, which includes Azure, O365 Commercial, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365 and other cloud product, came in at $33.7B, representing a 24% increase year-over-year. Microsoft’s go-forward success and revenue growth will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft’s ability get more customers to adopt cloud products, adopt AI solutions (Copilot for Microsoft 365, Copilot for Sales, Copilot for Service, GitHub Copilot, and Azure OpenAI) and migrate to the costly all-in Microsoft 365 E5 suite. In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how enterprise customers can take advantage of Microsoft’s needs and focus areas to ensure the right deal is struck at the negotiation table. He also covers what enterprise customers should expect from Microsoft as they prepare for their renewal negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow’s Q4 subscription revenue came in at $2.37B, representing 27% growth year-over-year while also beating guidance and analyst expectations. ServiceNow also raised their full year FY24 subscription revenue guidance by $165M, now expecting somewhere between $10.56B and $10.58B, which would represent 21.5 to 22% growth. In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as ServiceNow does everything it can to accelerate their Gen AI product adoption (specifically their “Pro Plus” SKU), while also continuing to upsell and cross sell their current customers and adding net new logos. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft made some pretty big announcements tied to their Copilot for Microsoft 365 offering. In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares his thoughts on each announcement and what customers need to be thinking about as they consider adopting Copilot for Microsoft 365.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce’s Q3 subscription and support revenue came in at $8.14B, representing 13% growth year-over-year, but fairly flat revenue growth when compared to other quarters in FY24. It also represents significantly lower growth when compared against the 18% growth posted last Q3. During the earnings call, CEO, Marc Benioff, made it clear that he and Salesforce are focused on:(1) Increasing profitability(2) Being the #1 AI CRM(3) Getting sales executives to be able to tell the stories of AI success(4) Delivering new products and new technologies (Unlimited Edition Plus, Data Cloud, Einstein GPT Copilot…etc.)(5) Delivering great implementations and making sure customers are successful(6) The Ohana 2.0 culture. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what Salesforce’s earnings mean for customers and what customers should expect from Salesforce as they push through renewal negotiations. In addition, Adam provides his perspective on how best to prepare for Salesforce’s aggressive push to upsell and cross sell their current customers. He also shares how customers can leverage Salesforce’s clear goals and areas of focus during their upcoming negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce’s Q2 FY24 total revenue came in at $8.6B, beating analysts expected $8.53B, and represented 11% growth year-over-year. Salesforce raised their full year FY24 revenue guidance from $34.7B to $34.8B, which would represent 11% growth year-over-year and beat the expected guidance of $34.65B. They stated recent price increases were accounted for in these numbers, but the increases did not have a significant influence on what they are now expecting for revenue. Elongated sales cycles, additional deal approval layers and deal compression were also factored into Salesforce’s revenue guidance. It was made abundantly clear that Salesforce is going to be heavily pushing Data Cloud and AI solutions, like AI CRM, onto their customer base. Both are seen as significant revenue and cloud expansion drivers for Benioff’s modern version of Salesforce: “AI + Data + CRM + Trust.” In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from Salesforce leading up to their year-end and beyond. He also shares how customers should approach Salesforce and how best to leverage Salesforce’s clear goals during their upcoming negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce announced that they will be increasing list prices by an average of 9% across Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Industries and Tableau products. Salesforce’s last list price increase was over seven years ago, so it was only a matter of time. As further justification for the price increases, Salesforce also cited the fact that they have delivered 22 new releases, thousands of new features, including recent generative AI innovations, over the last seven years.
In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares insights into the specific price increases and the products these increases will affect. He also shares his thoughts on what this means for Salesforce customers, including what customers should do to get ahead of their challenging renewal negotiations with Salesforce.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Oracle had an exceptionally strong quarter in FY23 Q4, showing considerable revenue growth across their Cloud Fusion (up 47%), ERP (up 28%), and NetSuite (up 24%) offerings. Over the past several quarters, Oracle has maintained steady growth numbers, especially for their cloud offerings, proving that they have caught up with competitors like Workday in the cloud market. The growth they are seeing in their cloud business is now outpacing the decline of on-premise environments as customers migrate to Oracle cloud.
In this podcast, our Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses how Oracle has been able to achieve such substantial growth and how their new Customer Success Service (CSS) offering could help them maintain that growth through value realization, higher renewal rates and portfolio expansions. Plus, he highlights some of the ways AI is being integrated into Oracle’s products.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Workday had another solid quarter in FY24 Q1. They announced a 23% growth in revenue, beating market expectations and their 20% target. However, with upcoming changes in leadership at the C-Suite level and an uncertain macroeconomic environment that’s causing elongated sales cycles, it will be critical for Workday to maintain the growth momentum they have built over the last several quarters.
In this podcast, our Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, highlights the key takeaways from the earnings call and ways customers can leverage Workday’s goals to achieve a more competitive deal, especially for Healthcare, Financial Services, and High Education customers which Workday’s sales reps continue to aggressively target.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Salesforce released their Q1 FY24 earnings, and while they did beat their previously forecasted revenue target, they reported their slowest revenue growth since 2010 and stated they expect this slowed growth to continue. Salesforce’s total revenue for the quarter was $8.25B, up 11%. Salesforce also reiterated full year FY24 total revenue guidance of $34.5B to $34.7B, which would represent 10% growth. In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what to expect from Salesforce as they navigate customer sales cycles and renewal negotiations. Salesforce is going to be focused on pushing customers to adopt more products through aggressive sales pitches that bring together logical product portfolios for the customer to adopt. This will likely include a strong pitch centered around Salesforce’s “AI + Data + CRM” strategy and Industry Cloud adoption. He also shares his thoughts on what customers should do to appropriately prepare for Salesforce’s playbook and approach to ensure they don’t leave anything on the table at the end of their negotiations with Salesforce.
ServiceNow’s FY23 Q1 subscription revenue came in at $2.024B, representing 24% growth year-over-year and beating the $1.996B analysts were expecting. ServiceNow also raised full year FY23 subscription revenue guidance, citing a pipeline that continues to look robust for the remainder of the year. ServiceNow closed 66 transactions in the quarter with over $1M in net-new ACV. This was up 27% year-over-year. ServiceNow also mentioned that 85% of its net-new ACV still comes from existing customers. In this podcast, UpperEdge’s ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as it works to upsell and cross sell its current customers while adding net new logos. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming negotiations and renewals.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft’s FY23 Q3 earnings were published yesterday, and total revenue was reported as $52.9B, better than the $51.02B analysts were expecting. Most importantly, Microsoft Cloud revenue (which includes Azure, O365 Commercial, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365 and other cloud products) was reported at $28.5B, representing a 22% increase year-over-year and coming in slightly ahead of expectations. However, Cloud revenue growth has slowed, especially when you consider it was 32% back in FY22 Q3. Microsoft’s go-forward success will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft’s ability get more customers to adopt Microsoft’s Cloud products. CEO Satya Nadella not only lead off his opening remarks with covering the Microsoft Cloud revenue growth but he also said one of the priorities Microsoft is going to focus on is “Helping customers use the breadth and depth of Microsoft Cloud to get the most value out of their digital spend.” In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how enterprise customers can take advantage of Microsoft’s focus on helping customers realize more value from their spend. He also covers what enterprise customers should expect from Microsoft in the coming quarters as they try to accelerate Microsoft Cloud growth.
Oracle closed out another strong quarter with the following highlights from their FY23 Q3 earnings call:• Cloud growth was up 45%• SaaS offerings like FusionERP and NetSuite showed increases of 20% and 26%, respectively.• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure’s consumption rate was up 86%• IaaS revenue was up 57% With numbers going up across the board, Oracle’s continued cloud growth reflects the current industry trends, and their numbers withstand a tough macroeconomic environment. As Oracle continues to think strategically about their revenue and consumption growth, Oracle customers need to have a firm understanding of this strategy so they can leverage it at the negotiation table. In this podcast, our Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, maps out some of Oracle’s goals that customers can use in their negotiation strategy.Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdNOracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Workday fell short of expectations in their most recent FY23 Q4 earnings call, but their revenue was still posted as a 20% increase year-over-year and their overall growth projections throughout the next FY remain accurate. These numbers are a direct result of elongated sales cycles in an economic downturn, but Workday continues to leverage their current customer base to increase renewal rates. In this podcast, Workday Practice Leader Jeff Lazarto gives a high-level overview of the recent earnings results. He also maps out what to expect from Workday in the coming year as they continue to accelerate growth as well as how customers can prepare for their upcoming Workday negotiations and renewals given this information.Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdNWorkday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Salesforce’s Q4 FY23 revenue came in at $8.38B, up 14% year-over-year and beating guidance ($7.93B - $8.03B) and analyst expectations ($7.99B / 9.2% growth). Salesforce’s full year FY23 revenue came in at $31.B, higher than guidance ($30.9B - $31B) and represented 18% growth year-over-year. Salesforce also provided full year FY24 revenue guidance of $34.5B - $34.7B that beat what analysts were expecting, but still showed a slowing growth of around 10%. During the earnings call, Salesforce, specifically CEO Marc Benioff, made it very clear that improving profitability is Salesforce’s highest priority. The goal is to make Salesforce the largest and most profitable software company in the world. In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from Salesforce during the year ahead and beyond. He also shares how customers should approach Salesforce and how best to leverage Salesforce’s clear goals during their upcoming negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Workday announced a 3% layoff of its workforce earlier this week. While these layoffs are significantly smaller than what we have seen from other major tech companies recently, there are still some important insights to gather from this reduction to their global workforce. These layoffs primarily affected the product and technology division, but Workday mentioned their plans to hire in their marketing and sales organizations and stated they do not plan to lay off more of their workforce in the immediate future. In this podcast, our Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses what these changes mean for customers in terms of where their product dollars are going, where Workday’s current focus is, and how to navigate Workday’s inevitably aggressive sales tactics following these layoffs.Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdNWorkday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
ServiceNow’s Q4 subscription revenue came in at $1.86B, representing 22% growth year-over-year even though cRPO fell short of guidance. ServiceNow pointed out during the earnings call that cRPO (revenue that will be recognized in next 12 months) was impacted by fewer early 2023 renewals than is typical in Q4. ServiceNow mentioned that they outperformed their Net New ACV and renewal ACV targets for the contracts that were expiring in Q4. ServiceNow’s full year FY22 subscription revenue also beat guidance, coming in at $6.89B, up 24% year-over-year. In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as ServiceNow works to upsell and cross sell their current customers while adding net new logos. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft’s FY23 Q2 earnings came out, and total revenue was reported as $52.7B, lower than what analysts were expecting ($52.9B). This revenue represented only 2% growth year-over-year, the slowest rate of growth since 2016 . Microsoft’s net income was also down 12%. Most importantly, Microsoft Cloud revenue was reported at $27.1B, representing a 22% increase year-over-year. While the associated gross margin increased from 70% to 72%, their Cloud growth rate has been slowing. Microsoft Cloud revenue growth was 32% in FY22 Q2 and 24% in FY23 Q1. Microsoft’s go-forward success will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft Cloud, which includes Azure, Office365, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, Power Apps, and other cloud solutions. In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how enterprise customers can take advantage of Microsoft’s focus on helping customers realize more value from their spend. He also covers what enterprise customers should expect from Microsoft in the coming quarters as they try to accelerate cloud growth.Host: Adam Mansfield: bit.ly/3rPGp8rMicrosoft Commercial Advisory Services: bit.ly/2V78ADX
Several key executives are leaving Salesforce, including Co-CEO Bret Taylor, Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield, Tableau CEO Mark Nelson and Chief Strategy Office Gavin Patterson. This substantial executive level exodus is certainly catching the attention of investors, Salesforce competitors and customers. In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares his thoughts on the executive departures and provides insights on how these departures could affect Salesforce customers at the negotiation table.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce’s Q3 FY23 total revenue came in at $7.84B, slightly higher than the expected $7.82B, and represented 14% growth year-over-year. However, Salesforce provided Q4 FY23 revenue guidance that came up short of what was previously expected, while also mentioning they were not yet ready to give FY24 guidance. Additionally, it was announced that Salesforce’s co-CEO, Bret Taylor, will be stepping down at the end of January 2023 (Salesforce’s year-end), stating that he wants to return to his "entrepreneurial roots.” In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from Salesforce leading up to their year-end and beyond. He also shares how customers should approach Salesforce and how best to leverage Salesforce’s clear goals during their upcoming negotiations.Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow’s Q3 subscription revenue came in at $1.742B, representing 22% growth year-over-year but lower than the expected $1.85B. ServiceNow also lowered their full year subscription revenue guidance from a midpoint of $6.92B to a midpoint of $6.86B, while maintaining an expected subscription gross margin of 86%.
ServiceNow now has 1,530 customers paying them over $1M per year, with the average annual spend among that group coming in at $4M. Eighteen of the top 20 deals in the quarter contained 5 or more products, which is another key metric for ServiceNow because it demonstrates their ability to sell a wide set of solutions to their customers, especially solutions outside of the core Technology Workflows product set like Employee, Customer and Creator.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow as ServiceNow’s year-end fast approaches. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow renewal negotiations.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
In their most recent earnings call, Microsoft beat revenue expectations but posted the lowest rate of revenue growth in five (5) years. Microsoft’s FY23 Q1 total revenue was $50.1B, up 11%. Microsoft Cloud revenue grew 24% to $25.7B, and for the first time exceeded 50% of Microsoft’s overall company revenue. Their go-forward success will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft Cloud, which includes Azure, Office365, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, Power Apps, and other cloud solutions.
In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how customers can leverage Microsoft’s clear focus on getting more adoption and utilization of Microsoft’s cloud, security solutions, Teams, Dynamics 365, and LinkedIn. He also explains why more customers should push for the more costly all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365 E5. Lastly, he covers what customers need to do to ensure they appropriately prepare for their upcoming renewal negotiations.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce’s Dreamforce Conference is a massive event filled with celebrity appearances, sessions, dinners, and hallway meetups. But for many attendees, it can be an overwhelming experience. In this video, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares his thoughts on how attendees and the companies they represent can get the most out of their time at Dreamforce while also using the event as an opportunity to gain leverage during the next Salesforce renewal negotiation.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3d7xDj2
Salesforce reported Q2 FY23 earnings and, once again, beat revenue expected by analysts. Salesforce’s total revenue for the quarter was $7.72B, up 22%, while analysts were expecting $7.69B. Despite this continued growth, Salesforce also lowered full year revenue guidance again. They are now expecting $30.9B-$31B, which would represent 17% growth year-over-year, but previously forecasted $31.7B-$31.8B.
Salesforce cited foreign exchange headwind as well as customers becoming more measured in the way that they buy as reasons for the lowered guidance. Customers buying habits include stretching sales cycles, executives scrutinizing purchasing decisions, and deal compression.
In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what to expect from Salesforce as they navigate customer sales cycles and renewal negotiations leading up to Salesforce’s year-end in January. Based on comments made during the earnings call, not only is Salesforce going to try to pull in as much net-new product adoption and growth as they can from their customer base, but they are also building plans to make up for any deal compression over the customer’s upcoming term. He also shares his thoughts on what customers should do to appropriately prepare for Salesforce’s playbook and approach to ensure they have the right deal in place before pen goes to paper.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Oracle laid off part of its U.S. staff earlier this week as part of its plan to layoff thousands in the U.S., Canada, India, and Europe. These layoffs were primarily concentrated in marketing and the customer experience (CX) department. Oracle’s CX solutions include CRM products which compete with Salesforce, the leader in this space. Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses what this may mean for this department moving forward. He also shares why he expects to see more layoffs tied to the massive, $28B acquisition of Cerner which was closed in June of this year. These layoffs come after talk of Oracle planning to announce an increase in support fees which would go into effect after December 1st, 2022.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
ServiceNow’s Q2 subscription revenue came in at $1.658B, representing 25% growth Year-over-Year. However, RPO (Remaining Performance Obligations) came up short of expectations primarily due to longer sales cycles and FX headwinds.
ServiceNow closed 54 transactions in the quarter with over $1M in new Annual Contract Value (ACV). ServiceNow now has 1,463 customers paying them over $1M per year, with the average annual spend among that group coming in at $3.9M. They also surpassed 100 customers that are paying over $10M per year. This increased customer spend can be directly attributed to the success expanding customer footprints - in Q2, 16 of the top 20 deals contained five or more products.
In this podcast, our ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as they work towards pulling in deals that may have slipped out and getting more products adopted as part of year-end renewals. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft missed on the top and bottom lines and posted their lowest earnings growth in two years according to their recent Q4 earnings call. Microsoft’s FY22 Q4 total revenue was $51.9B, which was up 12% but lower than what Wall Street expected ($52.4B) and lower than the high end of their adjusted revenue guidance ($52.6B). Microsoft Cloud eclipsed $25B in the quarter, representing a 28% increase year-over-year. Their go-forward success will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft Cloud, which includes Azure, Office365, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, Power Apps, and other cloud solutions.
In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how customers can leverage Microsoft’s clear need to show success in taking market share (Azure, Teams, Dynamics 365, Security, etc.), moving customers to “E5,” specifically the all-in cloud bundle Microsoft 365 E5, and accelerated revenue growth beyond the conservative guidance given. He also covers what enterprise customers should expect as they approach their upcoming renewals as well as how to prepare for Microsoft’s plan of attack.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
There has been recent talk about Oracle getting ready to announce an increase in support fees. While we haven’t yet seen Oracle documentation confirming this increase, we have heard directly from Oracle customers who received messaging about a change in support fees and an increase in Oracle’s support fee cap. UpperEdge Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses what we know so far.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
ServiceNow rolled out the new solution, Impact, earlier this year. If you are a ServiceNow customer, you have likely been pitched it and experienced an aggressive push to get it into your renewal.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, covers:
• What is ServiceNow Impact • Why Impact is so important to ServiceNow • What comes with each of the four (4) available packages • How it is priced • What concessions and commercial terms (discounting, protections, etc.) should be addressed
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Workday recently reported their FY23 Q1 earnings, and while it reported a good quarter, Workday did experience some challenges and deals being pushed to the second half of FY23. Organizations are responding to the looming economic uncertainty and resulting turnover at the executive level by tapping the breaks on engagements. While Workday still saw a subscription revenue growth of 23%, it was clear during the earnings call that there is some pressure because of organizations’ postponing deals out to the latter half of the year.
In this podcast, Workday Practice Leader Jeffrey Lazarto discusses how Workday will continue towards its goal of reaching $10B in revenue and more than 20% subscription revenue growth despite these added pressures as well as how customers can position themselves so they are negotiating in a buyers’ market.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Salesforce reported Q1 FY23 earnings, and once again posted a strong total revenue growth of 24% while beating top- and bottom-line expectations. During the earnings call, Salesforce Co-CEOs Marc Benioff and Bret Taylor pointed towards the increased relevancy of Salesforce’s Customer 360 platform as a driving force behind their revenue growth. They also pointed to the amplified Customer 360 value proposition that comes from recent acquisitions like Tableau, Mulesoft and Slack as a contributing factor to that growth. Despite this growth, Salesforce lowered full year revenue guidance by $300M, citing an increase in foreign exchange volatility.
In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what to expect from Salesforce as they work to ensure their “really strong” pipeline turns into booked revenue in FY23. He also shares his thoughts on what customers should do to appropriately prepare for Salesforce’s adjusted selling strategy aimed at achieving their goals during a tougher economic environment.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow held its annual Financial Analyst Day ahead of Knowledge ’22 this week, and there many key takeaways that current and new customers need to be aware of. ServiceNow is focused on expanding customer portfolios to include as many products within their 4 workflows (Technology, Customer, Employee and Creator) as they can. Their goal is to further entrench their solutions while also increasing customers’ annual spend.
In this podcast, our ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow as they push forward to become a $11B+ company by 2024. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
It's Day 1 of SAPPHIRE and Chip Hanna, UpperEdge's SAP Practice Director, has a few important insights to share regarding SAP's announcement of a new strategic partnership with McKinsey. Anyone who is considering SAP RISE will find important information in this relevant and timely podcast and will get some reading-between-the-lines from the SAP/McKinsey announcement.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP RISE Resource Center: https://bit.ly/3yv81VM
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Microsoft beat expectations on the top and bottom lines, posting FY22 Q3 total revenue of $49.4B. It is clear that the continued success is directly tied to Microsoft Cloud, which includes Azure, Office365, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, Power Apps, and other cloud solutions. Microsoft Cloud eclipsed $23B in the quarter, representing a 32% increase year-over-year.
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Microsoft needs to move more customers to their most robust “E5” offering and, in particular, the all-in-cloud bundle Microsoft 365 E5. This is especially important given the fact that Microsoft has not yet moved as many customers as they would have expected onto the bundle. In light of this, he also covers what enterprise customers should expect as they approach their upcoming renewals as well as how to prepare for Microsoft’s plan of attack.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow’s FY22 is off to a strong start, with a Q1 subscription revenue of $1.63B representing 26% growth year-over-year. ServiceNow closed 52 transactions in the quarter with over $1M in new annual contract value, an increase of 41%. ServiceNow has over 1,400 customers paying them over $1M per year, with the average annual spend among that group coming in at $3.9M. ServiceNow continues to leverage the “stickiness” of their customer base to expand their portfolios to include more products across their various workflows - Creator, Customer, Employee and Technology (formerly IT).
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as ServiceNow works towards their goal of becoming a $15B plus company by 2026. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Salesforce reported FY22 Q4 earnings, and once again posted strong revenue growth of 26%. They also posted 25% revenue growth for the full year while raising FY23 revenue guidance by $300M. It was very clear that Slack will be a focus for Salesforce moving forward as they expect turn it into a $1.5B business by the end of FY23.
In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what to expect from Salesforce as they lean on their customer base to reach their FY23 revenue target of $32B. He also shares his thoughts on what customers should do to appropriately prepare for Salesforce’s tactics to achieve their goals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow had another strong quarter and year, with subscription revenue of $1.52B in Q4 and $5.57B for the full year, representing 29% and 30% growth respectively. ServiceNow also now has 1,359 customers that pay over $1M per year, with the average annual spend being $3.8M. ServiceNow is able to do this through organic growth and executing to a strategy that has resulted in successfully getting more of their Workflow (IT, Customer, Employee, and Creator) products adopted as part of net-new deals and renewals.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus to accomplish their goal of growing from a $5.57B company to a $15B company and what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year. He also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft once again beat analyst expectations, posting FY22 Q2 total revenue of $51.7B. Their success is being driven by the Microsoft Cloud (which includes Azure, O365, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, Power Apps, and other cloud solutions). When selling their cloud solutions to enterprise customers, Microsoft will continue to pitch a “One Microsoft’ approach with the ultimate goal of getting them to use as many pieces of the Microsoft Cloud as possible. It is also clear that Microsoft will remain focused on leveraging their premium security, compliance, voice, and analytics solutions to get enterprise customers to move to the more robust (and costly) M365 E5.
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Microsoft’s focus on selling as many pieces of the Microsoft Cloud as possible will provide an opportunity for customers to optimize their go-forward commercial relationship and overcome Microsoft price increases coming in March 2022.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
There is a direct correlation between SAP system implementation failures and how companies approach the SI selection process. The traditional procurement approach is flawed and fails to account for the complexities of an enterprise SAP SI selection today. The demand for SI services in strategic industries is accelerating as companies come out of the pandemic and shift from a “preserve and protect” mindset to an “expand and grow” mindset. In this podcast, Director of IT Services, Greg Hall, discusses what new challenges companies face when selecting an SI for their SAP project and shares four critical success factors for making SI evaluations in today’s competitive and evolving environment.
Host: Greg Hall: https://bit.ly/3CcaELp
IT Services: https://bit.ly/3A5Hcov
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3rHgGkc
Salesforce reported FY22 Q3 earnings this week and, once again, Salesforce posted a strong revenue growth of 27% while also raising full year guidance. Additionally, Salesforce now has two (2) business units or “clouds,” that being Service Cloud and Sales Cloud, that have an annual run rate of $6B. It was also announced that Bret Taylor will work with Marc Benioff as the co-CEO of Salesforce.
Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Salesforce will focus and what tactics they will deploy to reach their FY22 revenue target of $26.4B, as well as their FY23 revenue target of $31B. He also shares his thoughts on Bret Taylor’s promotion to the co-CEO role and what it could mean for Salesforce customers moving forward.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
This is the third podcast in our three-part series covering SAP Support Model Case Studies. Listen to part one on SAP RISE here bit.ly/3k0SGEe and part two on the “Do It for Me” model here https://bit.ly/3mMGFnB
SAP customers migrating their SAP workload to the cloud have four primary support models to choose from. These include the “Do It Yourself” model, the “Do It for Me” model, the professional model, and SAP RISE. In this case study, a client chose the “Do It Yourself” model to move their SAP hosting services, infrastructure services, and infrastructure to the cloud leveraging their own internal resources.
This was an existing ECC customer who had some hyperscaler relationships within pockets of their organization. In their situation, it was appropriate, manageable, and scalable to select this support model because they had the in-house expertise to successfully do so. They chose to lift and shift their SAP on-premise relationship and existing cloud relationships into a single instance on the hyperscaler. There was a focus on hyperscaler optimization and the hyperscaler strategy drove a lot of their decision making. In this podcast, IT Sourcing & Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Chip Hanna, discusses the benefits of the DIY model as well as some key considerations for anyone interested in this option.
For more details on all four models and client examples for each, download our on-demand webcast, Defining Your SAP Cloud Strategy: Azure, AWS, GCP and RISE Compared bit.ly/3pQp40a
Host: Chip Hanna: bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: bit.ly/3yjImwb
This is the second podcast in our three-part series covering SAP Support Model Case Studies. Listen to part one on SAP RISE here https://bit.ly/3k0SGEe
SAP customers migrating their SAP workload to the cloud have four primary support models to choose from. These include the “Do It Yourself” model, the “Do It for Me” model, the professional model, and SAP RISE. In this case study, a client who was focused on their existing on-premise SAP ECC migration to S/4HANA chose the “Do It for Me” model, where they leveraged a 3rd party who takes care of the SAP hosting services and infrastructure services specific to SAP and sits on top of a hyperscaler of their choice.
This particular customer managed their applications themselves and had a highly customized environment with many 3rd party integrations. They wanted to move to S/4HANA in the cloud but since the RISE application stack excludes customizations, extensions, and 3rd party applications, RISE would have created challenges and was not the best support model for their ECC to S/4 transformation. In this podcast, IT Sourcing & Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Chip Hanna, discusses why this client chose to leverage a hyperscaler and the “Do It for Me” model and the benefits of doing so in their situation.
For more details on all four models and client examples for each, download our on-demand webcast, Defining Your SAP Cloud Strategy: Azure, AWS, GCP and RISE Compared https://bit.ly/3pQp40a
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
ServiceNow once again posted subscription revenue growth of 31%, beat previous guidance, and raised full-year guidance. ServiceNow also now has 1,266 customers paying over $1M per year with an average annual spend of $3.6M. ServiceNow is so confident in their ability to execute to their land and expand strategy that they continued to reinforce the fact that they are on a clear path to achieve $15B by 2026.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus to accomplish their goal of growing from a $5B company to a $15B company. This includes a sales pitch tied to selling as many products within each of their workflows (e.g., IT workflows, customer workflows, employee workflows, and creator workflows) as possible. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of some of these key insights in their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
This is the first podcast in our three-part series covering SAP Support Model Case Studies.
SAP customers migrating their SAP workload to the cloud have four primary support models to choose from. These include the “Do It Yourself” model, the “Do It for Me” model, the professional model, and SAP RISE. In this case study, a client chose the SAP RISE model where they were able to choose the hyperscaler but everything else is managed under contract through SAP with a single agreement.
This particular company had different ERP systems through acquisitions and divestitures, but they wanted SAP ECC to be their platform for the future. This was going to be a greenfield deployment for SAP and did not have a lot of 3rd party applications within the scope of RISE. However, even in completely greenfield deployments, companies need to approach SAP with a high degree of sophistication because of the nuances, traps, and hidden costs inside RISE. In this podcast, IT Sourcing & Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Chip Hanna, discusses why this client chose SAP RISE, the benefits of doing so in their situation, and what companies who select this support model should do to avoid the many challenges of moving to RISE.
For more details on all four models and client examples for each, download our on-demand webcast, Defining Your SAP Cloud Strategy: Azure, AWS, GCP and RISE Compared. https://bit.ly/3pQp40a
Host: Chip Hanna https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3CvSQKV
Microsoft beat analyst expectations, posting FY22 Q1 total revenue of $45.3B. Once again, Microsoft’s success is largely being driven by the success of the Microsoft Cloud (which includes Azure, O365, LinkedIn, Dynamics, and other cloud properties). Microsoft will continue to push enterprise customers to adopt (and use) as many pieces of the Microsoft Cloud as they possibly can, including motivating these same customers to use the most robust (and costly) editions (i.e., M365 E5). Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella, also mentioned that the Microsoft Cloud and the collective set of digital technology that comes with it, provides a deflationary force in an inflationary economy that will help customers navigate these times.
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Microsoft’s focus on selling customers as many pieces of the Microsoft Cloud as possible will provide an opportunity for customers to optimize their go-forward commercial relationship and overcome Microsoft price increases coming in March 2022. For more actionable advice, join our upcoming webinar, How to Tackle Microsoft’s 2022 Price Increases. https://bit.ly/3Clpb7f
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Oracle is getting more aggressive with their Java inquiries and has even created a Java sales team which is separate from their application and technology sales teams and their LMS audit teams. This separate unit is compensated for closing Java sales and they are using creative ways to identify and advance sales opportunities, often being very aggressive. Some customers have even said that at times, they seem to be more aggressive than the regular Oracle sales representatives. In this podcast, Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses how the Java sales team has been approaching companies and how what starts as a simple inquiry can quickly diverge into an aggressive sales cycle and potentially a technology audit. He also shares three items you must know if you’re contacted by Oracle, especially if they are contacting you regarding Java.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog:
Oracle has increasingly been including its Cloud Learning Services in their cloud proposals, often without the client even asking for it. Should your company invest potentially millions into purchasing these services to gain access to a series of learning and training solutions from Oracle University? Oracle Practice Advisor, Erwann Couesbot, discusses what Oracle’s Cloud Learning Services are and the three solutions it consists of (Cloud Learning Subscriptions, Guided Learning, and Oracle Learning Explorer which is the only free option). He also discusses discounts we've seen Oracle give and the steps you should take whether you decide you need the services now or not. For more information, read the blog An Enterprise Guide to Oracle Cloud Learning Services.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/3zuYPO1
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/39kDSu8
Workday acquired Configure Price Quote (CPQ) software provider, Zimit, which will allow Workday to offer quote-to-cash process automation to companies in services industries. While Workday has been doing very well in their recent earnings and are continuing to build out their solution offerings, aggressive growth through acquisitions, hiring, partnerships, and geographic expansion, can make it difficult to maintain the corporate culture that has been so integral to their success thus far. Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses what customers should expect and keep in mind as Workday continues to grow and make acquisitions. He also shares how these growth activities can present opportunities for customers to negotiate improved commercial terms and course-correct areas of their Workday relationship if needed.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Microsoft recently announced they are going to be increasing many Office 365 suites as well as the all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365 E3 pricing. Beyond increasing the ARPU (Average Revenue Per User), there are several other motivating factors driving Microsoft to make this decision.
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses why Microsoft is hitting their enterprise customers with this price increase and how customers need to start to prepare for what will be very challenging renewal discussions ahead.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Salesforce announced their FY22 Q2 earnings and they once again had another strong quarter, posting an impressive 23% revenue growth while also raising full year guidance by over $300M. On top of this, Salesforce once again reminded everyone how confident they are that they will hit $50B by FY26. Beyond the normal callouts to the strength of their product portfolio (the Customer 360) and the strong demand environment, each Salesforce executive made it a point to mention the very important role Slack is going to play in Salesforce’s success moving forward.
In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Salesforce will focus to accomplish these goals, including how they will position and use Slack as well as the tactics they will deploy to meet and exceed their $50B target. He also shares how enterprise customers can take advantage of some of these insights as they prepare for their upcoming Salesforce renewal negotiations.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Workday has received approval to sell their applications within the US Federal market and its Workday Government Cloud product is now listed on the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) marketplace. This is a huge opportunity for Workday who directly competes with Oracle in multiple areas. UpperEdge’s Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, shares his thoughts on this significant milestone.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Workday and Google announced a multi-year strategic partnership that will allow Workday applications to run on Google’s infrastructure. With both Workday and Google facing strong competition, this partnership and its joint go-to-market programs will create more sales and marketing channels that will help generate more opportunities and better position them to compete with the likes of Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, and AWS. In this podcast, Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses why this partnership makes sense (especially with Google Cloud under Thomas Kurian’s leadership) and how customers could benefit from the mash up.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
ServiceNow posted subscription revenue growth of 31%, beat previous guidance, and raised full year guidance. ServiceNow also increased the number of customers paying over $1M per year by 25%. Not only is ServiceNow clearly executing to their land and expand strategy, but they are also having success pushing more products into the portfolios of net new customers as well. In Q2, the average deal size for net new customers grew over 50%.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus to accomplish their goal of growing from a $5B company to a $15B company. This includes a sales pitch tied to selling a solution made up of pieces of each of their workflows (e.g., IT Workflows, Customer & Employee Workflows, and Creator Workflows) and a new purchasing vehicle, the Now Buying Program. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of some of these key insights in their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3xic4Aj
Microsoft once again beat both top and bottom line expectations as well as prior business segment revenue guidance. It is clear that Microsoft’s overall success and ability to achieve $60B in profit, is being driven by the success of their Commercial Cloud. Moving forwards, customers will heavily rely on Commercial Cloud and the products that make it up (Office 365, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, LinkedIn, Azure, Power Platform, etc.). As covered by both Satya Nadella and Amy Hood during the earnings call, Microsoft is going to push the full “stack” of cloud offerings and pitch it as the only solution for today’s businesses.
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Microsoft’s focus on selling customers as many pieces of their cloud as possible will provide an opportunity for customers to optimize their go-forward commercial relationship.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Oracle announced a new rewards program where customers who migrate or move their workloads over to Oracle’s Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) can receive a 25% reduction on their on-premise support costs. For example, if a customer consumes $1M in OCI credits, they will be discounted $250K towards their on-premise support costs. While this may sound great, there is a potential catch. Before enrolling, customers should ensure this is a program they can really take advantage of. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle practice leader, discusses the caveats to be aware of and gives more information on Oracle’s OCI discounting in this podcast. For more details, read the related blog, Oracle Support Rewards: 4 Caveats Every Customer Should Know, here: https://bit.ly/3zUXRvz
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3yjYaPn
On June 9th, 2021, Oracle released its new Java Management Service (JMS). The free service is meant to help customers track, monitor, and optimize their Java usage across the entire enterprise. While it may sound great on the surface, using JMS could put customers at a greater risk of being audited by Oracle. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader, speaks more about Oracle’s JMS and the risks it poses in this podcast and in his blog, Java Management Service (JMS) – Beware of Oracle’s Trojan Horse
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3rSV8iH
In their recent Q1 earnings call, Co-CEOs Chano Fernandez and Aneel Bhusri spent a good amount of time talking about Workday’s growth goals and where they are focusing their efforts. First, hey are looking to increase their global work force by more than 20% (2,500 new hires by the end of 2021). Second, and this is a longer-term goal, is to get to $10B in annual revenue; they are currently forcasting $4.5B for 2021. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday Practice Leader, gives insight into why these focus areas are important to Workday, but more so, the impact it will have on Workday customers.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3A6KOXt
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3A7hUq9
Salesforce announced their Q1 FY22 earnings and they once again had another strong quarter. CEO, Mark Benioff, mentioned that they are not only raising FY22 revenue guidance to $26B, but that this $250M increase is the largest raise they have ever had. On top of this, Salesforce once again reminded everyone how confident they are that they will hit $50B by FY26. Salesforce’s “super strong” pipeline and ability to hit an all-time high in 7-figure-plus transactions with more than 4 clouds on average is driving Salesforce’s success.
In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Salesforce will focus to accomplish these goals and the tactics they will deploy to reach their $26B revenue target this year and $50B target four years from now. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of some of these key insights in their upcoming Salesforce negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Last week, ServiceNow held its virtual Financial Analyst Day event ahead of its annual Knowledge conference kick off. During it, ServiceNow laid out how they will grow from $5.5B in revenue at the end of 2021 to $15B in FY26. It all comes down to the tried-and-true SaaS vendor “land and expand” playbook. Beyond putting an emphasis on landing new customers, they are going to rely on growth, cross selling (i.e., pushing more products into customer portfolios) and upselling (i.e., pushing customers to the most robust and costly editions).
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus to accomplish these goals and the tactics they will deploy to reach their $15B revenue target. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of some of these key insights in their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Workday has stated in earnings calls that it will be investing in accelerating pipeline growth and advancing their strategic product roadmaps. It will make investments in tuck-in acquisitions, enhancing development capabilities and in increasing marketing, branding, and sales campaigns. While customers could benefit from enhanced functionality on the product side, the investments in sales and marketing could create challenges for many customers while creating potential opportunities for others. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday Practice Leader, discusses what he’s seeing in the market and how Workday’s investments can create leverage for some customers to negotiate more competitive pricing and better commercial terms.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37crDix
ServiceNow had another strong quarter, exceeding high end revenue guidance and Wall Street estimates. On top of that, they now have over 1,100 customers paying over $1M per year, which represents an impressive 23% growth from last year.
ServiceNow’s goal is clearly to expand customers’ portfolios and for net new customers to start out with as many products as possible from as many of their “workflows” as possible. This includes its IT Workflows product set (ITSM, ITOM, ITBM, GRC (now IRM), and Security Operations, etc.), their Customer & Employee Workflows (CSM, Field Service Management, HR Service Delivery, etc.) and their Creator Workflows. To accomplish this, they are using the “better together” solutions pitch which seems to be working.
In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus moving forward and the tactics they will deploy to reach their $10B revenue target. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft had another strong quarter, beating both top and bottom line analyst estimates as well as prior revenue guidance. Microsoft continues to rely heavily ramping adoption of the products within Microsoft’s commercial cloud technology stack (e.g., Microsoft 365, Azure, Power Platform, Dynamics 365, LinkedIn, etc.) and has proven to be successful in doing so. Microsoft’s Commercial Cloud revenue came in at $17.7B for the quarter, which represented an astounding 33% growth. What does this mean for customers?
In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Microsoft is focusing specifically such as moving more enterprises to the most robust all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365 E5, and pushing customers to utilize as many Microsoft products as possible through an “industry solution” approach (e.g., Microsoft Cloud for Retail, Healthcare, Manufacturing, Financial Services and Non-Profit). He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming Microsoft year-end (June) negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
We’re seeing a new twist on the dynamic of Oracle audits which has long been a source of fear and frustration among customers. As Oracle pushes their clients to adopt its more profitable cloud software solutions such as Fusion ERP and Autonomous Database, they are increasingly auditing existing software to find out-of-compliance situations and initiate a sales cycle to push cloud software packages as a way to remedy their customers’ “predicaments”. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdges’s Oracle Practice Leader, discusses the uptick we’ve seen in Oracle audits, how Oracle customers can prepare for them, and who likely is and isn’t at a risk of an audit in the near future. For more on this topic, read An Oracle Audit is a Sales Exercise in Disguise.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3A16VhR
Nearly every enterprise has at least one relationship with a SaaS cloud provider. Unfortunately, cloud vendors such as Salesforce, Workday, ServiceNow, Microsoft, etc., often take actions or communicate in ways that frustrate enterprise cloud customers and potentially even harm the relationship. In this podcast, Practice Leader Adam Mansfield, discusses the complaints he most often hears from IT, Line of Business and Procurement executives at enterprises paying for SaaS cloud subscriptions.
Oracle’s Q3 FY’21 earnings call made headlines after Larry Ellison touted cloud growth while making a dig at SAP. He stated that over 100 new customers who either fully or partially moved to Oracle’s cloud products had switched over from SAP. He went on to say that SAP’s customers are “up-for-grabs” because SAP has not rewritten any of its software for the cloud, essentially saying they are not a true cloud provider. In this podcast, Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader, goes into more detail about the significance of Ellison’s comments and what the results of the earnings call means for Oracle and its customers.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Salesforce had yet another strong quarter and a strong year despite the challenges the pandemic presented. With 24% growth in full year revenue, Salesforce achieved its longtime goal to become a $21B company. In the earnings call, Benioff talked about how they were set up ahead of the pandemic and how relying on their own products, enabled them to be successful. They also posted an impressive 40% growth for their biggest driver of revenue, “Salesforce platform and Other”.
The earnings call presented a lot that customers need to pay attention to moving forward such as the fact that Salesforce is raising its full year 2022 revenue guidance by 200M, projecting they are going to see 21% growth to become a $25.75B company this time next year (which includes closing the Slack deal). Once the Slack merger is approved, they are going to continue to build Slack into more of their products. They also raised their FY22 Q1 guidance by $170M.
Overall, Salesforce’s pipeline is strong and built on top itself over the year. Salesforce will continue to invest in building out its sales team to keep up with demand. In this podcast, Practice Leader Adam Mansfield, discusses the key takeaways customers should be aware of and how they can start preparing for Salesforce’s inevitably aggressive sales push of Customer 360, especially as Salesforce works to justify their record-breaking $27.7B acquisition of Slack, as well as the earlier acquisitions of Tableau and Mulesoft.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Workday is looking to fill out their product portfolio through acquisitions as opposed to going out and buying market share which is a strategy Oracle once used back in the early 2000s. Peakon will allow Workday to gather data on employee engagement, diversity & inclusion, health & wellbeing, as well as company culture. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Practice Leader for Workday, discusses more about this $700M acquisition and how it ties into Workday’s VIBE Central dashboard which launched in 2020.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37crDix
If you are considering Oracle and you begin to evaluate an Oracle Fusion HCM proposal, it is important that you insist on full pricing transparency. This will enable you to conduct your due diligence, build out some financial modeling, and evaluate different pricing scenarios. UpperEdge's Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses three key terms to review in this podcast.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
ServiceNow had another strong quarter and year, beating expectations and landing even more customers spending over $1M per year. While ServiceNow’s revenue is still heavily coming from its IT Workflows solutions (ITSM, ITOM, ITBM, GRC (now IRM), and Security Operations, etc.), ServiceNow continues to gain adoption of Customer Workflows (CSM, Field Service Management) and Employee Workflows (HR Service Delivery). They have also seen significant growth in Creator Workflows (Now Platform App Engine and IntegrationHub). In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where ServiceNow will focus moving forward and the pitches he expects them to make as they work to reach their $10B revenue target. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft had a strong Q2, crushing revenue expectations, while continuing to rely heavily on its commercial cloud offerings (e.g., Microsoft 365, Azure, Dynamics 365, LinkedIn, etc.). Commercial Cloud revenue ($167B) was up 34%. In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Microsoft is focusing specifically such as ramping Azure consumption, moving more enterprise customers to the most robust all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365 E5, and selling more Dynamics 365 solutions centered around the value derived not just from the Dynamics 365 business application but the complete Microsoft commercial cloud offering that can be leveraged. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming Microsoft year-end (June) negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Many Microsoft enterprise customers are about to embark on their first renewal negotiation since adopting the all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365. Many will be faced with significant challenges as the appropriate contractual and commercial arrangement, including pricing, was not previously put in place. The good news is, there is still a path forward that can result in an optimized and improved go-forward contractual and commercial relationship with Microsoft. In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, covers the common challenges enterprises face in their Microsoft 365 renewal negotiations and how best to overcome them.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3foRDLR
Justin Parker, UpperEdge's Practice Director, discusses the importance of an IT cost optimization framework. To truly be successful at optimizing your IT costs, your efforts cannot be seen as one-time events, it's what you have to do on ongoing basis—thus making a framework for your programs exceedingly important.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
IT Cost Optimization Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3s1fTcl
Justin Parker, UpperEdge's Practice Director discusses how to best identify, assess and analyze potential IT cost optimization opportunities. Earlier this year Justin co-hosted a webcast: “Driving Effective Cost Reduction: It’s All-Hands-on-Deck!" where he covers this topic in-depth; this podcast is an excerpt from that webcast.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
IT Cost Optimization Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3s1fTcl
Over the last several years, UpperEdge Practice Director, Justin Parker, has supported many clients with their SAP hosting RFPs and advised them on the appropriate sourcing strategy to ensure that their objectives are met today and well into the future. This podcast is an excerpt from the webcast: Demystifying the SAP Hyperscaler Hosting Market, where Justin highlights several considerations for managing an SAP Hosting RFP Process.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
There’s an important role that internal alignment plays on the success of your IT cost optimization program. Early in 2020, Justin Parker, UpperEdge Practice Director co-hosted a webcast: “Driving Effective Cost Reduction: It’s All-Hands-on-Deck!” where he covers this topic in-depth; this podcast is an excerpt from that webcast.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ilLUIJ
Unlike some of its competitors, Oracle is seeing growth and better performance overall in 2020. However, it’s slow growth as Oracle moves to the cloud and off of its dominant on-premise solutions, which takes in revenue upfront vs. cloud subscription revenues. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader, gives insights on Oracle’s move to the cloud, new streams of revenue, and profitability.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
UpperEdge Practice Director, Justin Parker, discusses how many organizations are grappling with the key decision of where and how they will host their SAP workloads. More recently, organizations are starting to consider one of the many hyperscaler hosting platforms. There are several market dynamics driving this shift such as increasing customer expectations, overall pace of change in the IT market, and organizations’ digital transformation strategies.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
If you’re concluding a year-end deal with SAP in 2020, there are many things you need to think about. SAP, like everyone else, has had to readjust expectations with the market. They made some major leadership changes, but they are looking ahead with relief and optimism. With this in mind, Chip Hanna, UpperEdge’s SAP Practice Director, covers four strategies to approach SAP as the year comes to an end.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3Clbaab
Salesforce officially announced they are acquiring business communication platform, Slack, for roughly $28B. Why did Salesforce make its largest acquisition in history and what does it mean for current Slack and/or Salesforce customers? What should enterprises expect from Salesforce as it pushes them to adopt Slack and replace Microsoft Teams? In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, answers these questions and shares his perspective on how enterprises can take advantage of the intensified battleground between Salesforce and Microsoft.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Salesforce had another strong quarter even during a pandemic, posting 20% revenue growth while even raising full year guidance. Salesforce posted impressive revenue growth across all its clouds (Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Platform & Other as well as Marketing and Commerce Cloud). Salesforce’s ability to raise full year revenue guidance is directly attributable to a strong pipeline that CRO, Gavin Patterson, mentioned is tied to the increased level of access they have with decision makers. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from Salesforce moving forward as they look to meet and exceed raised full year revenue guidance and achieve their objective of becoming a $25B company next year. He also shares how enterprises can take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming negotiations and renewals. Salesforce also officially announced they are acquiring Slack for roughly $28B. Adam will be providing insights on what this means in an additional podcast.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
UpperEdge's Len Riley chats with Alex Winthrop about how Accenture was particularly impacted by the global pandemic and what actions they took this year that customers should be aware of. —Discussion based on blog: How Accenture’s Strategy Evolved in 2020 – Published October 21, 2020
Understanding the pros and cons of Private Cloud vs. Public Cloud is essential to selecting the right scenario for your business. Through a combination of market research and experience supporting our clients going through similar transformational choices, Brian Undlin, IT Sourcing & Negotiation Analyst at UpperEdge has identified factors to help you decide whether a private or public cloud would be the best fit for your company. More in-depth analysis on this topic can be read in Brian’s blog at upperedge.com.
As the shift to digital accelerates, more enterprises are turning to the cloud to drive efficiencies, lower IT costs, and support work which now requires more collaboration. Alphabet reported that Google Cloud revenue increased 45% in Q3. It is clear that Alphabet is going to continue to aggressively invest in Google Cloud with headcount increases in technical and sales roles, further built-out go-to-market capabilities, and most likely acquisitions. Google Cloud has shown they are ready to take market share and win even more GCP and Workspace (formerly G Suite) customers. The announcement that they are going to finally breakout Google Cloud as a separate reporting segment starting in Q4 is one indicator of their confidence. They are going to provide not only Q4 information but full year 2018, 2019, and 2020 revenue and operating income. In this podcast, Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from Google Cloud’s sales executives who have clearly defined goals. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their Google Cloud negotiations.
Microsoft had a strong start to its Fiscal 2021 and overcame the devastating impact the pandemic has had on many business including many of Microsoft’s customers. Microsoft was able to beat expectations across the board, relying heavily on its commercial cloud offerings (e.g., Microsoft 365, Teams, Azure, Power Platform, Dynamics 365, LinkedIn, etc.). Commercial Cloud revenue ($15.2B) was up 31% in Q1 and now represents 41% of total company revenue ($37.2B). Microsoft is clearly focused on pushing more enterprise customers to the all-in cloud bundle Microsoft 365, moving customers to the most robust E5 edition, getting more Azure use, ramping Power Platform adoption, and selling more Dynamics 365 solutions while taking market share from Salesforce. They have been and will continue to rely on the aggressive sales pitch that “Microsoft offers the most complete and highest value solutions for enterprises”. In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from Microsoft's sales executives who have clearly defined goals. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow beat expectations and exceeded the high end of revenue guidance despite COVID while also raising full year guidance. Subscription revenues were up 31% and they now have over 1000 customers with annual spends greater than $1M. ServiceNow is going to continue to position themselves as the platform enterprises need to ensure digital transformation success. They will continue to focus on pushing IT Service Management (ITSM) customers to the more robust ITSM Pro and getting customers to adopt additional products such as IT Operations Management (ITOM), HR Service Delivery, and Customer Service Management (CSM). In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from ServiceNow’s sales executives who have clearly defined goals. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
On an annual basis, Workday requires clients to do a true up, to which clients ask, “How come when we do a true up, we have to pay more for overuse, but never get a refund for underuse?” Workday’s pricing, as given in an order form, represents (from their perspective) a minimum annual spend amount for the entire term. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday practice leader, discusses why Workday has these pricing structures in place and why you are likely to have to pay more for Full-Service Equivalent (FSE) worker counts and SKUs after each true up. For a more in-depth analysis of Workday’s payment structures, download his recent webcast recording: Ask the Experts – Workday Licensing.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Many Workday customers are concerned about paying subscription fees in year 1 of their contract while they are going through their deployment. Workday’s typical response is that everyone must pay in year 1 because it is a cloud platform and they are constantly innovating—even while you’re deploying. However, Workday has started to make some exceptions to this position. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday practice leader shares insights into these exceptions. For a more in-depth analysis of Workday’s payment deferrals and structures, download his recent webcast recording: Ask the Experts – Workday Licensing.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Workday deals consist of a number of factors and unique challenges, the top questions customers have is around pricing— e.g. “Is our proposal pricing from Workday a fair one?”, “Is our prior deal a good one?”, “Where do we stand within the market?”. To start answering these questions, you need to look at your benchmarking factors, which consist of list prices, discounts, net fees on a line-item basis, full service equivalents (FSEs), SKUs and more. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday Advisory Leader breaks down the components of a Workday deal in this podcast, and in his recent Workday Webcast downloadable at upperedge.com.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
If you’re an existing SAP customer, how can you determine what your licensing requirements are under the Digital Access Model? Truth be told, the answer hasn’t gotten any clearer. SAP has since introduced a Digital Access Evaluation service to help, however this is a guise for a soft audit which SAP will use to find gaps in your licensing to immediately monetize. Chip Hanna, UpperEdge’s Advisory Practice Director discusses these issues and more in this podcast and in his blog, “SAP and Digital Access – It’s Still a Mess”
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3yoIOcm
Many customers are sharing their financial challenges with their system integrators - especially as it relates to priorities, allocation of funding, and the state of the business. But asking your SI what staffing issues they may have and where they stand in relation to their own revenue targets is equally important as it can shed light on whether your SI is willing to commit to more collaboration. In this podcast, Chip Hanna, UpperEdge’s Advisory Practice Director, discusses four strategies for working with your SIs during times of financial uncertainty. Listen for more insights and read Chip’s blog, “4 Strategies for Engaging SAP SI's During This Downturn”.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/2WHpAki
Google has rebranded G Suite four years after launch, renaming it to Workspace while also creating new pricing tiers to appeal to current and targeted enterprise customers. Google, and Head of Workspace, Javier Soltero (former VP of Office Product Group at Microsoft), understand that Google must continue to innovate, integrate their productivity and collaboration tools, and craft new editions in order to have a better chance to take market share from Microsoft and keep Slack out. In this podcast, Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, covers the announcement and what it means for enterprises moving forward.
SAP’s hosting option, HANA Enterprise Cloud (HEC) was launched in 2013. In 2019, SAP shifted its focus and launched Project Embrace to add support for the hyperscalers (Amazon, Google and Microsoft Azure). These moves by SAP are to prepare their customers for the end of ECC support in 2027. Brian Undlin, UpperEdges IT Sourcing Analyst, discusses where and how to host SAP, hosting licensing strategies, architecture needs and more. Read Brian’s blog, Shrinking Markets Force Customers to Re-Evaluate SAP Hosting Options, for additional insights.
Host: Brian Undlin: https://bit.ly/3ysLKVK
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3xh4OEJ
Chip Hanna, UpperEdges Sr. Director answers 3 questions regarding the Qualtrics IPO and its impact on its customers.
- How much control do you have in your agreement with Qualtrics now and in the future?
- If considering a major investment in Qualtrics, or the C/4HANA Suite, should you buy now or wait until after the IPO?
- How does this all fit with your plans to migrate from ECC to S/4?
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Workday launches VIBE (Value Inclusion Belonging in Equity) and other new products that tie into its HCM platform. These new products are designed to add functionality as it relates to inclusion and diversity. There are two products, VIBE Central, which centralizes inclusion and diversity data to more easily track progress against benchmarks. The second product is VIBE Index, which is for HR Leaders to set strategy and create tailored plans to drive positive outcomes (available in Q1 2021). Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday practice leader, adds further details in this podcast and in his blog: Workday VIBE Launches to Address Diversity and Spur Growth
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2WRcbX9
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3A7akeY
Accenture will be cutting 5% of its workforce, which equates to 25,000 employees. This is a normal practice for the company to continually improve on their talent base. What’s not normal is that Accenture’s CEO, Julie Sweet, said that the annual rehiring of new talent to exceed the 5% loss would be halted. With the lack of new talent coming into Accenture, companies should expect to see a shortage of top talent in key roles going forward. In this podcast, Greg Hall shares what customers can do to ensure they receive the most value from Accenture despite these layoffs.
For more on this topic, read: How 25,000 Accenture Layoffs Will Impact Customers
In this interview-style podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how addressing the fees tied to Salesforce Shield is an often overlooked way to reduce your Salesforce costs. He shares some of the pricing and commercial concerns associated with Salesforce’s security add-on and provides his recommendations for how customers can address those concerns to gain greater transparency, lower the cost of Salesforce Shield, and ultimately reduce their overall Salesforce costs.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3rSe9Sv
Oracle Java Account Representatives are surprising Oracle customers with out-of-the-blue calls where they ask specific questions about the customer’s Java use. These calls have sparked concern among recipients who worry that this might be the start of an audit. In this interview-style podcast, our Marketing Manager asks Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, what these Java inquiry calls are really about, what Oracle customers should do, and why he thinks these calls are on the rise.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3Cbc5tG
Salesforce had another strong quarter, surpassing $5B in quarterly revenue for the first time. Salesforce posted impressive revenue growth across all of its clouds (Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Platform & Other as well as Marketing and Commerce Cloud). It capitalized on retailers’ increased need to rely on online sales channels during the pandemic, resulting in Commerce Cloud revenue growing 89% in the quarter. Salesforce also raised full year revenue guidance indicating a stronger-than-expected pipeline and confidence to increase customer spend profiles. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from Salesforce moving forward as they look to meet and exceed raised full year revenue guidance. He also shares how enterprises can take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
SAP customers will eventually have to move from Indirect Access to Digital Access. In an effort to speed up this process (which benefits SAP), SAP created their Digital Access Adoption Program (DAAP). The financial answers to know whether to stay on Indirect Access past 12/21 or to take advantage of the program are complex. Devin Djerf, UpperEdge’s Senior Analyst, is seeing SAP clients saving by not adopting. In this podcast, he discusses the steps you should take to determine if you should adopt now or wait.
Host: Devin Djerf: https://bit.ly/2VuynFS
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Workday offers three different tiers of Customer Success packages Though Workday doesn’t actively promote their packages, every Workday customer should at least be aware of them. Workday offers three different tiers of Customer Success packages (Silver, Gold, and Platinum) each with a different set of deployment and post go-live services. Erwann Couesbot, UpperEdge's Senior IT Sourcing Negotiation Advisor discusses their differences, tiering, why they are important and his recommendations. You can also get more in-depth information about this topic from Erwann's blog at UpperEdge.com
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2TTLjEO
The bulk of Oracle’s support renewals come up in late July and early August. If you're an Oracle customer, it's around this time that you may realize that you didn’t get the support you needed from Oracle yet your support fees continue to increase. One way to manufacture leverage for your Oracle support renewal is to consider third-party support. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader, discusses 6 key considerations to keep in mind as you evaluate your third-party support options.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3lp6r0Q
ServiceNow eclipsed the $4B annual run rate for the first time after beating consensus and guidance. The company is so confident in their portfolio of cloud solutions (ITSM, ITBM, CSM, Sec Ops, HR Service Delivery, etc.) and the proven sales tactics and pipeline they have in place, that they raised growth and profitability guidance for the year. Expect ServiceNow to continue to push their current enterprise customers to expand their footprint and for new enterprise customers to start out with a larger footprint with more than three products. In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect moving forward as ServiceNow looks to achieve their $10B revenue target. He also uncovers key insights enterprises can take advantage of in their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Microsoft is clearly confident their portfolio of cloud solutions (Microsoft 365, Teams, Power BI, Power Apps, Dynamics365, LinkedIn, Azure Active Directory, etc.) and proven sales tactics will continue to push more enterprises to expand their Microsoft footprint. Microsoft beat expectations for the quarter and passed $50B in annual Commercial Cloud revenue for the first time. They also mentioned successes such as a growth in commercial bookings, growth in Office 365 seats, increased Azure margins, and increased annual revenue per user (ARPU). In this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what enterprises should expect from Microsoft's sales executives who have clearly defined goals. He also shares how customers could potentially take advantage of key insights from the earnings call in their upcoming negotiations and renewals.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Google Cloud just kicked off their 9-week digital event series and made some important announcements in the keynote. Enterprises in particular should be aware of the key announcements (such as the launch of BigQuery Omni, Confidential VMs and industry-specific solutions) that will likely impact them as Google Cloud continues to focus on building and selling products that address the needs of enterprises.
In this podcast, Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Google Cloud is ultimately looking to gain market share under the leadership of Robert Enslin and Thomas Kurian. He shares what he expects will be the focus of the messaging they will aggressively approach enterprises with and how Google Cloud will take Microsoft and Slack head on. He also covers what potential and current Google Cloud customers should strive for when establishing a relationship with Google Cloud in order to reap the most long-term value.
Erwann Couesbot, UpperEdge’s Oracle Senior Advisor discusses common mistakes customers make when trying to assess their licenses for Oracle Technology Products, and more specifically the NUP (Named User Plus) metric Oracle uses. The top mistake is users tend to refer to their entitlements vs. how many people and devices are accessing Oracles software. Oracle doesn’t limit clients to their entitlements, therefore it is very easy to become out of compliance. Listen now for a more in-depth analysis and go to UpperEdge.com to read his related blog.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3C8PnSR
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ymHUNx
Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday Practice Leader gives a rundown of the top 6 things to do for Workday customers looking to expand their Workday product portfolio. Start with assessing your current deal, look at the competitiveness of your pricing and commercial terms, this will put you on good footing for negotiation leverage, especially if you have any existing pain-points or issues you’ve needed to address. Listen further for additional tips and read Jeff’s blog, “Workday Solution Expansion – 6 Customer Mistakes” for more insights.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ik7zB3
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3yl8Ld0
Salesforce beat expectations with $4.87B in revenue for the quarter, which represented 30% year-over-year growth. Despite lowering their full year revenue target to $20B, a $1B reduction, the earnings call was filled with optimism. Salesforce is confident that its broad portfolio of products will enable them to lead the Fortune 500 through their accelerated digital transformations. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses the commission guarantee Salesforce gave its sales representatives, what Salesforce is doing to help its customers in the economic downturn, and what this all means for enterprise customers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Salesforce announced the appointment of Gavin Patterson as President and Chief Revenue Officer of Salesforce. After joining Salesforce last year and quickly rising within the company, he is now the new leader of Salesforce’s global sales organization. With former co-CEO, Keith Block, stepping down earlier this year, could CEO, Marc Benioff, have a plan in place to eventually move Patterson into the co-CEO role? In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares his perspective on what this leadership change means for Salesforce and discusses how enterprises should prepare for Patterson’s time with their senior executives.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Workday has broken up their Full-Service Equivalent (FSE) workers into different categories: Salaried Workers, Hourly Workers, Part-time Workers and Contingent Workers. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday practice leader explains why it’s important to pay attention to how you categorize and breakdown your workforce based on this new structure; you can find flexibility and cost savings within it.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ik7zB3
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/2WOUx6k
ServiceNow's recent earnings call showed a strong quarter and a confident Bill McDermott who emphasized the company's continued opportunity for growth in a post-COVID-19 world where companies will "embrace permanent transformation". In this podcast, Adam Mansfield, breaks down ServiceNow's "Fast-Start playbook" which features pre-packaged bundles they will be aggressively pushing onto companies. He also warns of the potential downsides of bundling and shares how enterprises can protect themselves from these pitfalls to better ensure long-term value.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/2WICJcV
Microsoft outperformed expectations set even before the coronavirus pandemic and beat estimates on the top and bottom lines. Microsoft’s strong quarter was driven by the Commercial Cloud Business, which is largely driven by Azure and Office 365. Though both showed strong growth in Q3, it is important to note that growth for both is slowing down. In the earnings call, Executive VP and CFO, Amy Hood, stated that “Microsoft does well when our customers do well” but what do Microsoft customers need in order to do well? In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his thoughts on what that means and discusses how enterprises should approach Microsoft during these uncertain times.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, announced their Q1 FY20 earnings which included an announcement that Google Cloud (GCP and G Suite) now has quarterly revenue of $2.78B, giving them a $11B run rate. Both GCP and G Suite continue to maintain strong growth that should not slow down any time soon based on the continued interest from enterprises. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield, shares his thoughts on what to expect from Google Cloud and how enterprises with interest in adopting should approach Google with their interest.
Most organizations have shied away from reducing costs of their SAP platform during lean times, but that’s no longer the case considering the breadth and depth of the economic impact of Covid-19. Chip Hanna, UpperEdge’s SAP Practice Director discusses some opportunities around AMS and hosting that companies have to drive down costs. There are a few levers companies can use—commercial levers on existing agreements, operational levers on relationships with AMS and hosting providers, and competitive levers to drive cost negotiations.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/37euUh0
ServiceNow beat guidance and consensus in Q1 FY20 with subscription revenue growing 34%, reaching $995M. ServiceNow’s success is largely tied to the significant growth in the number customers that have expanded their portfolios and are now paying over $1M per year. There has been increased adoption of key products including but not limited to ITSM Pro, HR Service Delivery, and CSM. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares what this impressive quarter means for enterprises and what enterprises interested in becoming a new ServiceNow customer (or adding new products) need to do to prepare for ServiceNow’s revamped sales playbook.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
The coronavirus pandemic has forced companies to seek financial relief in any way they can. Given the sizable spend tied to IT, many organizations start their cost reduction initiatives with a focus on cloud vendor spend. This is an opportunity for cloud vendors to lean into the relationship and provide win-win support. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares the most frequent requests he hears enterprise customers asking of their IT and cloud vendors.
With all the changes in the market, Oracle is poised to dominate, so long as they are willing to adapt, evolve and potentially trailblaze. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Oracle’s Practice Leader, discusses a few of these steps Oracle can take, starting with consolidation of their cloud appications as one business. Bringing in a single, true applications leader, could inturn bring in the additional talent they need to develop applications similar to how Microsoft has done under the helm of Satya Nadella.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ijfPkH
As the coronavirus pandemic wreaks havoc on the economy, companies are understandably scrambling to reduce costs where they can. But prematurely engaging IT vendors without a well-thought-out plan can cause irreparable harm to your relationships - with both your internal stakeholders and your vendor partners. In this podcast, Practice Leader, Len Riley, shares the lessons he learned when he led cost optimization initiatives at CVS Health during the 2008 financial crisis and discusses the critical internal work that has to be done before engaging the vendor community. Understanding the priorities of internal stakeholders in times of a crisis is an essential step to take before engaging vendor partners. Len covers each of the internal stakeholders you should consider, his prospective on their priorities, and how to navigate these relationships to prepare successful cost-reduction strategies.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
IT Cost Optimization Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fnRloI
Javier Soltero, the General Manager and VP of G Suite at Google, recently reported that Google now has 6 million paying business customers. In February of 2019, Google had 5 million paying users and 4 million the year before. Announcements like this further demonstrate the success Google is having in penetrating businesses and gaining adoption. Microsoft is also well aware of Google’s success and has been approaching their base of customers and doing whatever they can to keep Google out. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield, shares his perspective on what this all means for enterprises and what you should expect from Google and Microsoft moving forward.
On March 30th, Oracle announced that they are offering free online training and certification courses for Oracle cloud infrastructure and Oracle Autonomous database. Oracle doesn't often offer free resources of this nature but this comes in the midst of shelter-in-place orders and lockdowns around the globe. Oracle customers can take advantage of Oracle's free training now through May 15th. To learn more and start your free training, visit Oracle.com.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Microsoft made a few announcements earlier this week that were all centered around their all-in cloud bundle, Microsoft 365. They announced two Microsoft 365 plans for consumers (Microsoft 365 Personal and Microsoft 365 Family) as well as a consumer edition of Teams which will be coming later in the year. Lastly, Microsoft rebranded the Office 365 solutions for small to medium-sized business as “Microsoft 365” solutions. During this podcast, Microsoft Practice Leader shares his thoughts on what this means for consumers but also how these announcements will ultimately impact enterprise customers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3C5y597
How is the Coronavirus impacting the SaaS market? This can be an opportunity for SaaS providers to step up, be leaders and demonstrate the true partnerships they have with their clients and employees. Workday has taken the initial step of paying a cash bonus to their employees, equalling two weeks of pay or roughly $80M. This was a pretty bold move as they are relatively small in comparison to their competitors, Oracle, SAP and Microsoft. Following suit, Marc Benioff announced that Saleforce would not being conducting any significant layoffs for at least the next 90 days and encouraging other CEOs to make the same 90 day pledge. Equally important—will these companies do right thing with their customers? Jeff Lazarto UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader discusses some measures that are underway.
Microsoft announced that they have renamed their firstline worker (deskless) worker products, Microsoft 365 F1 and Office 365 F1. As of April 1, 2020, they will be known as Microsoft 365 F3 and Office 365 F3. Microsoft also announced that there is going to be new “lighter” Microsoft 365 F1 available to the market and Teams (which is included in these firstline products), will have additional functionality included. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield, our Microsoft Practice leader, provides more details regarding the changes and provides his thoughts on what this all means for Microsoft enterprise customers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Workday added 11 new Fortune 500 companies, about 45% of the Fortune 500 are now HCM customers, which comprises about 60% of the Fortune 50. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s practice leader breaks down Workday’s Q4 fiscal year 20 results, and talks about whether Workday’s HCM cloud solution could replace Oracle’s and SAP’s solutions.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jhUk30
Claims that Oracle has misrepresented the nature of some of their cloud sales over the number of years has prompted lawsuits from shareholders. Some of these cloud deals weren’t all brought on by customer demand but instead by duress. In using their audit levers for on-premise licenses, Oracle would offer sweetheart deals to settle their audit claims so long as clients were willing to purchase cloud services even if those cloud services were not needed. UpperEdge’s Oracle Advisory Leader, Jeff Lazarto, highlights events around this case and Oracle’s cloud performance.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3A3vtGZ
In addition to Salesforce reporting its Q4 and full year FY20 earnings, they also announced that they are acquiring Vlocity for $1.3B and that their co-CEO, Keith Block is stepping down. This surprising leadership change could have major implications and raises many questions. Where will Keith Block go next? Will Salesforce alter the way they do business with Marc Benioff going back to the sole CEO? In this podcast, practice leader, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on this big news and discusses what it means for Salesforce customers moving forward.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
In its first earnings announcement since Sundar Pichai took over as CEO, Alphabet broke out both Google Cloud revenue (which includes GCP as well as G Suite revenue) and revenue from YouTube advertising for the first time. Though this is more transparency than we've seen in the past from them, they still refrained from disclosing the revenue tied specifically to GCP and G Suite. They also did not provide more granular details such as their total number of commercial users of G Suite. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his thoughts on Alphabet's Q4 and full-year FY19 earnings and discusses what you can expect from Google in 2020 as they strive to show accelerated Google Cloud growth and close more large enterprise deals as they compete aggressively with Amazon (AWS) and Microsoft.
Ted Rogers, Practice Leader at UpperEdge, refers to a recent conversation he had with a Project Manager overseeing an application development project for his client. The conversation was a timely one coming on the heels of Ted's recent blog, 5 SOW Essentials to Make You Look Smart. From vendors to clients, it's extremely important to have a solid statement of work in order for all parties to agree upon the project deliverables and when those deliverables are due.
Host: Ted Rogers: https://bit.ly/2V7h1z3
Project Execution Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3xlw9px
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/2TO7cFl
Accenture recently announced that it is the first partner to achieve SAP-certified integration with SAP Model Company delivered through MyConcerto. Given their plan to deliver together in an integrated and single engagement, customers considering this model should take time to understand the partnership dynamics and how their integration will influence the relationship. In this podcast, Chip Hanna shares three points that customers should keep in mind before engaging SAP and/or Accenture and discusses how customers can take a proactive role in managing risk both commercially and from a scope perspective.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3C6ovCR
ServiceNow reported outstanding Q4 FY19 numbers and growth, beating analyst estimates. New CEO, Bill McDermott's, confidence in ServiceNow was evident as he clearly laid out their key priorities and go-to-market strategy for scaling ServiceNow and ultimately achieving their lofty 2020 goals. Enterprises should prepare to be approached by an aggressive and highly motivated sales force with precise value propositions. UpperEdge's ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, uncovers the implications of this positive earnings call and highlights the most important numbers that enterprises need to be aware of.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ynVYq4
Microsoft had yet another strong quarter, with commercial cloud (which includes Azure, Office 365, Dynamics 365, and commercial aspects of Linkedin) clearly being a key component of Microsoft's successful quarter and the driving force for their future success. Can Microsoft achieve its overarching goal to be known as the only truly comprehensive solution on the market that can enable the sweeping digitization that organizations are striving towards? In this podcast, Adam Mansfield, shares his perspective on this positive earnings call and reads between the lines to reveal the compelling sales pitch that enterprises need to brace themselves for now as their Microsoft relationships continue to evolve.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Larry Ellison is trumpeting the huge technological advantage Oracle has in the database market and how this is the only autonomous database in the world. On Oracle’s recent Q2 earnings call, Mr. Ellison elaborated on the Autonomous Database’s benefits and their go-to-market land and expand approach.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/2Vvpvjm
Oracle has gone on record multiple times stating that Cloud ERP Applications and Autonomous Database are the two key product areas that will determine Oracle’s success. Larry Ellison has made some bold claims regarding both product categories. Jeff Lazarto discusses Oracle’s perspective of the Cloud ERP market and why they are claiming that they will eventually be the overwhelming winner in this generation of Cloud ERP.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ijctyn
Predicting what this year holds for current ServiceNow enterprise customers is a bit of a challenge with former SAP CEO, Bill McDermott, now at the helm. However, when considering the recent announcements ServiceNow has made and what we know about McDermott, we can see that there are some clear directions they will take and potential changes in store. Being able to anticipate the direction ServiceNow is headed and the potential changes the company may make will allow enterprises to better manage their go-forward relationship with ServiceNow. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his predictions for what we can expect from ServiceNow in 2020 and ultimately what enterprise customers should start to prepare for now.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Looking at the current state of the market (cloud and on-premise) as well as the changes and announcements that Microsoft has made in the past helps us understand what the future could hold for the tech giant. Having a sense for what Microsoft is going to be focused on and the changes and behavior that comes with this, allows enterprises to better manage their strategic relationship with moving forward. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his predictions for what we can expect from Microsoft in 2020 and ultimately what enterprise customers should start to prepare for now.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
When talking with enterprises about their strategic vendor relationships, we always consider what we have seen from the vendor in the past and what we are currently seeing in the market. But around this time of year, many conversations inevitably lead to what can be expected in the year ahead. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his predictions for what we can expect from Salesforce in 2020 and ultimately what enterprise customers should start to prepare for. If his predictions prove correct, one of them will result in significant changes for more than just Salesforce customers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Erwann Couesbot, UpperEdge's Oracle Practice Advisor and Java Expert, discusses the 2 main license agreements covering different versions of Java. This podcast highlights some of the key differences organizations have to consider to ensure that their Java usage is not out of compliance.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3C8PnSR
Erwann Couesbot, UpperEdge's Workday expert discusses using Workday as a System Implementation partner over other Large SIs like Accenture, Deloitte, IBM etc. There are 3 common pricing models most SIs offer which you should be sure to ask Workday about if you choose them as your SI partner.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2TTLjEO
Application Management Support (AMS) providers aren’t winning or preserving AMS awards based on rate arbitrage alone. In this podcast IT Sourcing & Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Greg Hall, explains how CIO’s, CTO’s, and infrastructure leaders want more from their AMS delivery providers.
When it comes to the cloud, the thing Microsoft wants even more than revenue growth is accelerated usage of their cloud offerings (Office 365, Microsoft 365, Teams, etc.) by their enterprise customers. Microsoft is now looking to the open-source community as well as the consumer market to help drive enterprises to increase their cloud usage. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on Microsoft’s recent announcements and how each is ultimately intended to achieve Microsoft’s goal of ramping enterprise cloud usage.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Greg Hall, UpperEdge's IT Sourcing Advisor discusses how to maintain and control a fixed price outsourcing agreement and how to manage change with the introduction of Deadband, ARC and RRC metrics.
Erwann Couesbot UpperEdge's AWS Practice Advisor discusses AWS's Enterprise Discount Program and his take on the top 3 commercial terms any potential AWS enterprise customer should negotiate when considering this program.
Workday’s numbers are outstanding with 26% YoY growth, 28% subscription growth. Their execution and strategy are working well, they are seeing growth in HCM, Finance, Planning and Analytics products by adding six F500 customers and eleven Global 2000 customers. Customer satisfaction rate is over 97%, their customer base is over 3,000 and they’ve added over 400 employees. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge’s Workday Practice leader delves into more of Workday’s promising financials in this podcast.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Salesforce beat Wall Street revenue and earnings estimates, posted 33% overall revenue growth for the quarter and had a net loss of $109M while maintaining previously raised full year guidance. During the earnings call, Chairman and Co-CEO, Marc Benioff also restated the lofty $35B revenue target for FY24. It is clear that in order to effectively double their revenue in five years, they will need to get more customers to buy into and adopt the Customer 360 (now Customer 360 Trust) which will include an expansion of the customer’s Salesforce portfolio. They are counting on this as well as getting ramped adoption and revenue from recently acquired MuleSoft and Tableau. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on how Salesforce is going to achieve these goals and discusses what Salesforce’s loyal customer base needs to start preparing for.
One of the most eye-opening announcements made at Dreamforce came during Salesforce’s Investor Day Finance Review presentation where Salesforce set an ambitious goal for themselves - reach $35B revenue by FY24. The target itself is eye-catching but the fact that it will require them to double their revenue in just four years is even more noteworthy. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on how Salesforce is going to achieve this lofty goal and discusses what Salesforce’s loyal customer base needs to start preparing for.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
For many reasons, SAP customers are increasingly looking to refresh their SAP hosting strategy and turning to hyperscalers like AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. Given the pace of change in the hyperscaler market, there are many considerations that organizations should keep in mind as they evaluate their options. In this podcast, IT Sourcing and Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Justin Parker, discusses what is driving the shift to hyperscalers and shares 6 recommendations for developing a sourcing and vendor management strategy that is well-positioned to support your SAP hosting objectives now and in the future.
Host: Justin Parker: https://bit.ly/3C895y4
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, reported that revenue was up 20% but profits were down 23% in Q3 FY19. Profits were impacted significantly by the 25% increase in expenses associated with new employee additions largely tied to technical and sales roles at Google Cloud as well as Google Cloud’s ongoing investments in infrastructure. Alphabet is clearly betting on and significantly investing in Google Cloud to better compete with Microsoft and AWS. Now the pressure is on Google Cloud’s new sales leadership team to close more enterprise deals. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on why Google Cloud is not breaking out their Google Cloud revenue and what to expect from the Google Cloud sales team if you are an enterprise on their radar.
When the Department of Defense (DoD) first issued an RFP for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (“JEDI”) last November, Oracle almost immediately filed a lawsuit claiming that the RFP process violated federal procurement law. After being removed from consideration, Oracle continued to go to court and lost on the grounds that Oracle failed to meet the requirements. Oracle has since appealed that ruling, but on Friday, the DoD announced that it is awarding the $10B JEDI cloud contract to Microsoft over AWS. In this podcast, Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto discusses what this means for Oracle and how Oracle’s persistence in the matter could impact its reputation.
For more on this topic, read the related blogs: Victim Card – Oracle Whining and Litigating for the JEDI Deal and Why Oracle’s Government Legal Battles Matter for Customers
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Related Blogs: https://bit.ly/3im7ooJ https://bit.ly/3jgRbk5
Microsoft had another strong quarter with overall revenue growing 14%. Its Q1 FY20 earnings call made it clear that Microsoft is going to rely on their ability to infuse innovation (like AI) into its offerings to differentiate themselves, increase customer spend, and win more business. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his perspective on how Microsoft is performing and discusses what to expect from Microsoft as they continue to push more enterprises towards Microsoft 365 and Azure.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
It’s always important to pay attention to how a vendor within your portfolio is performing and what is said in their earnings call but this is especially true when there is a CEO change as significant as the one that just happened at ServiceNow. Q3 FY19 is the first earnings call since the shocking announcement that CEO John Donahoe is being replaced by former SAP CEO, Bill McDermott. Their comments in the call sheds light on how the company and its focus will change with McDermott at the helm. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield shares his thoughts on how ServiceNow is performing and what current ServiceNow customers should expect going forward.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Less than a month after his departure from SAP, it was announced that Bill McDermott will join ServiceNow by year-end 2019 as President and Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors. He is replacing John Donahoe who is leaving to become Nike’s new CEO. McDermott will now have the chance to lead a cloud-only software company where he will bring not only his years of industry experience but also a large rolodex of connections he has made within enterprises – a space that ServiceNow is trying to penetrate and expand within. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield discusses what this means for ServiceNow and what to expect if you are current ServiceNow customer or considering ServiceNow.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Outsourcing your Infrastructure Managed Services comes with its own sets of risks. Poor planning and preparation creates undue risks that could have been mitigated upfront. In this podcast, IT Sourcing & Commercial Advisory Practice Director, Greg Hall, shares five common risks that can derail your efforts, break your business case, and start you off on the wrong foot with your chosen provider. He also walks through each one and discusses what you can do to mitigate these risks to position yourself for success.
Host: Greg Hall: https://bit.ly/3CcaELp
IT Services Sourcing and Negotiation Support: https://bit.ly/3A5Hcov
There has been much confusion and anxiety around Java use this past year and many organizations are still not sure whether they are required to purchase a commercial license. Concerned about the potential financial exposure that could be tied to Java use in the event of an Oracle audit, many readers and clients sent us questions and comments in response to Senior Advisor, Erwann Couesbot’s blog, The Top 3 Reasons Oracle Java Users are Unknowingly Out-of-Compliance. In this special interview-style podcast, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager asks Erwann some of the most common questions we received including the top question: “How can I ensure my organization is in compliance with regards to our Java use?”.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3C8PnSR
This podcast is part of our Head in the Clouds series which covers the latest cloud computing news from the perspective of someone who helps enterprises improve their cloud vendor contractual relationships. This week, Adam shares his thoughts on Facebook’s unification of Workplace and Portal to further expand its current customer base of 3 Million paying Workplace users and increase adoption among enterprises. He also discusses how Zendesk continues to roll out new products aimed at landing more enterprise customers by giving them products that they may actually need.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
The US Department of Interior is moving over 84,000 users back to Office 365 after its previous decision to go with Google despite the many challenges that come with such a massive change. Needless to say, this is clearly a significant loss for Google Cloud as they strive to ramp adoption of G Suite within the government and large enterprises. The optics associated with the government’s decision to move such a large number of users back to Microsoft’s Office 365 will be problematic for Google Cloud unless they can successfully get out in front of it. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield discusses what this all means for Google Cloud and how enterprises considering a possible move from Office 365 to G Suite can avoid facing an undesirable situation like this one.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
This podcast is part of our Head in the Clouds series which covers the latest cloud computing news from the perspective of someone who helps enterprises improve their cloud vendor contractual relationships. This week, Adam shares his thoughts on Zendesk’s recent moves to land more enterprise customers. He also discusses how Google Cloud restructured its sales organization to better position themselves to grab enterprise market share.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
This podcast is part of our Head in the Clouds series which covers the latest cloud computing news from the perspective of someone who helps enterprises improve their cloud vendor contractual relationships. This week, Adam shares his thoughts on Slack’s recently released Q2 FY20 earnings – the company’s first earnings since going public. He also discusses Google Cloud’s efforts to land even more enterprise customers by expanding alliances in the partner ecosystem through its recent hiring of SAP veteran, Dave Hutchison, which has not yet been publicly announced.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
This podcast is part of our Head in the Clouds series which covers the latest cloud computing news from the perspective of someone who helps enterprises improve their cloud vendor contractual relationships. This week, Adam shares his perspective and insights regarding Salesforce’s recently released Q2 FY20 earnings as well as Google Cloud’s announcement aimed at making G Suite and Hangouts more “sticky”.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Salesforce had another strong quarter and raised FY20 revenue guidance, indicating that they expect even better quarters ahead. Knowing that their customers are focused on digital transformations, Salesforce is aggressively pushing the Customer 360 Platform as the solution that will enable their success. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield discusses the recent acquisitions that are starting to pay off and the actions Salesforce is taking to continue to grow revenue.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
On the heels of the MapAnything acquisition back in April, Salesforce is buying ClickSoftware, a field service and workflow management software company for $1.35B. Salesforce continues to focus on building out its field service offerings realizing that this space is where its competitors, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP have increased their own investments.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, recently reported Q2 FY19 earnings and shared a very interesting bit of information; Google Cloud’s annual run rate is now $8B. The last and only time Alphabet shared Google Cloud’s annual run rate was in February of 2018 when it was $4B. In this podcast, Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how they achieved this impressive growth in such a short period of time and covers what enterprise customers should know (and expect) if they are considering Google Cloud Platform (GCP) or contemplating a move from Microsoft Office 365 to Google G Suite.
As many SAP customers begin their ECC to S/4HANA migration journey, we’re noticing many organizations focusing too heavily on some elements of their sourcing strategy and not enough on others. In this podcast, SAP Practice Leader, Len Riley, discusses the four key elements of the sourcing strategy that you must contemplate with your team in order to establish a holistic and integrated sourcing strategy that will enable your ECC to S/4HANA transition. He also describes the three major challenges we often see with software, system implementation, hosting and application maintenance and support vendor evaluations and negotiations that are often overlooked and critical to enabling your successful migration from ECC to S/4HANA.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
SAP ECC to S/4HANA migrations are complex projects that come with many challenges but they also represent opportunities for customers to improve their previous licensing agreements. However, this complex undertaking requires significant planning since SAP’s motivations for S/4HANA migrations directly conflict with the motivations of its customers. In this podcast, SAP Practice Leader, Len Riley discusses what SAP’s motivations are, how they differ than their customers’ motivations, and the two key questions customers must answer before they even begin the negotiation process.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
ServiceNow beat market expectations with another strong quarter. Their positive results support the underlying message of their recent rebranding and change in marketing and sales approach – ServiceNow is no longer just a tool for IT. In this podcast, Analyst Bearson Smith, discusses some key highlights from the earnings call, what ServiceNow’s shift in focus is really about, and how customers can ensure they are getting more than just the right price.
Host: Bearson Smith: https://bit.ly/2TW2LZk
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
If you are a Salesforce customer, you may not be aware that Salesforce recently removed their standard renewal price protection from their Master Subscription Agreement. Besides the fact that customers are now completely exposed and Salesforce has increased leverage at renewal, this also gives us a glimpse into the strategies and approaches being developed behind the scenes at Salesforce as they look for ways to increase spend and adoption from their customer base.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Judson Althoff, executive vice president of Microsoft's Worldwide Commercial Business organization, kicked off Microsoft Inspire 2019 with a promise that all solution areas will get better in FY20. Specific to Microsoft Teams, he said, customers are going to see more collaborative capabilities and AI capabilities. A focus on innovating Teams and adding capabilities makes perfect sense as Microsoft is aggressively trying to ramp usage in order to keep competitors like Slack out of their customers’ ecosystems.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
Oracle shared some interesting facts in its Q4 earnings call that uncover the latest tactics its using to expand product adoption, forecast Autonomous Database growth, and seed its customer base. In this podcast, Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto discusses some concerns with the numbers being reported and what potential and current Oracle customers should expect and prepare for when considering Autonomous Database.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
In its recent Q4 earnings call, Oracle focused on the security features of both Generation 2 Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI2) and the Autonomous Database. In today’s world of data breaches routinely making headlines and the resulting fall from grace of company CEOs, Oracle’s sales pitch is ultimately about providing high-level security that ultimately saves the CEO. In this podcast, Oracle Practice Leader Jeff Lazarto, discusses what Oracle is claiming about OCI2 and Autonomous Database and what this means for current and potential customers.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Google Cloud CEO, Thomas Kurian, recently stated they want to be the easiest cloud provider to do business with. Amongst a number efforts to achieve this distinction, they will introduce easier pricing and easier contracting. In this podcast, Adam Mansfield discusses why this is a smart approach and how it would differentiate Google from rival cloud vendors like Microsoft, Amazon and even Salesforce if it's successful.
As you prepare for your cloud subscription renewal negotiation, it is important to first assess and understand the goals and objectives of the cloud vendor sitting across the table from you. There are certainly universal things that matter to all cloud vendors pretty much at any point in time, like increased spend and product expansion but there are a few things that matter most to ServiceNow right now. Based on experience, knowing these things and how best to use them will have a significant impact on the success of your upcoming renewal negotiation.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Happy customers and successful projects equals high customer satisfaction and a retention rate of over 100%. Even with all of Workdays recent success, you have a great amount of leverage in constructing your first deal with Workday. Jeff Lazarto discusses how you need to understand what a highly competitive deal looks like, and how you can go about obtaining such a deal—there are strategies you can implement to achieve these results.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Salesforce had another strong quarter with revenue growth of 24%, and Service Cloud revenue breaking the $1B threshold for the first time. They also raised full year profit guidance. It is very clear that in order for Salesforce reach their self-imposed $26B revenue target by FY23, they will need to successfully sell enterprise CEOs on Salesforce being the only company that can truly provide them with the increasingly valuable 360 view of their customers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
The higher education industry can expect to continue to field many calls from Workday account executives. Workday has taken more of a targeted approach with respect to gaining customer adoption of its Financial Management solution. The first industry Workday focused on was the public sector which includes both government and education. Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge's Practice Leader, breaks down what these moves mean for Workday and its growing competition with Oracle.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Now that Oracle has been officially eliminated from the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (“JEDI”) RFP process, they are pushing forward with their lawsuit against the Department of Defense (DoD). Jeff Lazarto, UpperEdge's Oracle Practice Leader discusses how Oracle, in short, is claiming to be a victim in a rigged RFP and procurement process.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
SAP’s annual conference in Orlando is in full swing. In this podcast, UpperEdge’s SAP Advisory Practice Leader, Len Riley, discusses his observations and first impressions. He shares his thoughts on how this year’s conference compares to previous years so far, what SAP is doing well, and what SAP could have done better.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Day 1 of ServiceNow’s annual conference kicked off with a keynote focused on changing lives at work through technology and how ServiceNow is the right vendor to make that happen. ServiceNow will continue to focus on bringing new mobile features to market to increase the value of its solutions while mapping to customer needs. In this podcast, UpperEdge’s ServiceNow Advisory Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, shares some key takeaways from the conference and what he has learned by talking with ServiceNow customers in attendance.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
If you are becoming a new customer of Workday (or any cloud vendor), it is extremely important to get your first deal right. Not only do you have the most leverage at this time but your first deal will set the precedent going forward. In this podcast, Workday Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses the key parts of your negotiation leverage as a new customer as well as the specific areas you should address when negotiating your first deal. For more on this subject, see our related blog post: Workday Negotiations - First Impressions Matter and Precedents Matter.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
Related Blog: https://bit.ly/3ynjvYp
Alphabet reported that overall company revenue increased 17% to $36.3B but came up short of the expected $37.3B. Other revenues (which includes Google Cloud) reached $5.4 billion, up 25% year-over-year. Though Google Cloud Platform has strong customer momentum and remains one of the fastest growing businesses in Alphabet, Alphabet and Google still have not released Google Cloud revenue or utilization. Why and when will they?
ServiceNow beat analyst estimates and raised full year 2019 subscription revenue and billings guidance. ServiceNow posted Q1 subscription revenue of $740M which represented an impressive 40% growth y-o-y. They closed 25 deals in the quarter with ACV greater than $1M which brings total customers fitting this profile to 717. Expect ServiceNow to continue to find ways to expand ITSM adoption within existing customer base and add emerging products like CSM.
SAP made some significant announcements in its Q1’19 earnings call that will have implications for SAP customers. SAP is focusing on improving margins, Bill McDermott wants fair market value for SAP’s software, and Elliott Management takes a $1.5B stake in SAP. In this podcast, Len Riley discusses how Elliott Management will not just be focused on the operational efficiencies of SAP but more on revenue side of the equation, meaning the relationships you have with SAP Sales Executives will be less flexible and more stringent, with more decisions and approvals being made from the regional CFOs offices.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Microsoft had another stellar quarter, beating expectations and posting double digit growth, both for top and bottom line. These impressive financial results were directly tied to the continued strength of their cloud business. Commercial Cloud revenue grew 41% with Office 365 commercial revenue up 30% as a result of continued install base expansion and average revenue per user (ARPU) growth. Azure revenue also grew 73%, driven by strong growth in Microsoft’s consumption-based business. As they work to continue down this path of success, expect Microsoft to aggressively push for more Office 365 adoptions and for more workloads to be placed on Microsoft’s cloud.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
After 27 years at SAP, Robert Enslin resigned from his position as President of the Cloud Business Group. In this podcast, UpperEdge’s SAP Practice Leader, Len Riley, discusses how SAP is restructuring its leadership responsibilities, the challenges SAP will face from these changes, and how customers will be impacted.
Host: Len Riley: https://bit.ly/3fqLI99
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Oracle has been struggling to meet Wallstreet’s expectations for cloud revenue. To motivate their on-premise customers to migrate to the cloud, they have offered two key cloud incentive programs: Universal Cloud Credits and Bring Your Own License (BYOL). In this podcast, Erwann Couesbot discusses what customers need to know about these programs, including the key benefits of both and potential downsides you need to keep in mind.
For more on this subject, see our recent blog: Oracle’s Cloud Incentive Programs: Sweet Nothings?
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3C8PnSR
Some things we’re seeing from Oracle coming out of their Q3 earning are similar to what we saw with IBM a few years back. Their revenue is flat or slightly declining (like IBM’s was) but their earnings per share are growing, just like IBM’s had—the main reason for this? Stock repurchasing program, like IBM had done, Oracle is doing the same now, Oracle just spent in Q3 alone $10B to buy back 206M shares, and in the past 12 months they have bought back 728M shares, resulting in an overall reduction of 16% of all outstanding shares. The similarities of their financial moves go on, listen to this podcast and read the accompanying blog for further insights.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Best Practice Metrics for Tower-based I&O Services
When going to market to secure proposals for Infrastructure and Outsourcing (I&O) services, the responses you receive can be overwhelmingly complex and can challenge your ability to do a true apples-to-apples comparison. This 5-part series takes you through the steps you should take to ensure your responses are not only normalized but aligned in a manner so you can operationalize your agreement(s), once finalized.
How CIO’s can ensure they maintain control of their sole source negotiations: Make no mistake, your SI’s plan to secure a sole source award for your Implementation is set in motion from the moment they land resources to begin the strategy phase of your transformation initiative. There are several key tactics SIs will employ to lay the foundation to obtain a sole source implementation award.
Workday's performance in Q4 2019 has been going very well. Workday's subscription revenue was up 33% YoY, they are forecasting more than 27% growth next year and their customer satisfaction rating is at 98%. How are they going about doing this? Their focus has been on HCM, which is the hallmark of their product base and continues to show value to their clients. Once this value is realized, Workday can then introduce clients to an ever growing product portfolio.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3fq96DV
In this podcast, Adam Mansfield provides a recap of Salesforce’s Q4 and full year Fiscal 2019 earnings call. Once again, Salesforce posted impressive revenue growth across all of their clouds. They also raised their FY 2020 guidance and announced they are now targeting FY 2023 revenue of $26B-$28B. If they were to achieve this, they would essentially organically double their revenue in the next 4 years. Salesforce’s confidence in reaching this ambitious goal comes from the trusted partnerships they established with CEOs and the vast array of offerings they have to drive value and digital transformation success for them and their businesses.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Erwann Couesbot discusses some of the main commercial hurdles when it comes to Workday negotiations. Similarities exist when negotiating with major ERP companies, but there are some important differences when negotiating with Workday. They are not a full ERP provider yet, but with M&A they are moving up fast to compete with the likes of SAP and Oracle. This podcasts discusses important commercial terms you need to consider for your next negotiation with Workday.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Workday Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2TTLjEO
Mergers and acquisitions are opportunities for SAP to push S/4HANA onto clients. During an M&A there is an optimistic air to discuss synergies, efficiencies and future benefits. But SAP at this time is thinking about big acquisition budgets, revenue opportunity and the possibility to audit either or both companies. SAP will take this time to win in the short term as as well as the long term for future sustainable revenue. Chip Hanna discusses 3 M&A situations to prepare for as SAP will look to expand its S/4HANA adoption onto its clients during this time of exposure.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Part of SAP’s 2019 Capital Markets Day presentation centered on “The SAP Top Ten” which includes SAP’s ambition to be #1 in Cloud ERP by 2023. There was also a significant amount of time devoted to C/4HANA’s evolution, its position against competitors like Salesforce, and how the recent acquisition of Qualtrix comes into play.
Host: Chip Hanna: https://bit.ly/37gknCk
SAP Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3yjImwb
Oracle’s recent legal battles with the U.S. government have been widely reported. Here is a brief summary of the two prominent legal battles and what they could mean for Oracle customers.
Host: Jeff Lazarto: https://bit.ly/37eCXdN
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3jdtF7p
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, reported Q4 and full year earnings that beat expectations across the board. The company did not provide a lot of detail regarding its cloud business which is part of its “Other Business” category. What they did mention is that they doubled the number of Google Cloud Platform (GCP) deals worth more than $1M and doubled the number of multi-year contracts. Regarding G-Suite, they noted that they now have 5 million paying customers -- up from 4 million a year ago. It is clear that Google is going to invest and scale when it comes to their Google Cloud business. Enterprises will need to chart their course appropriately and this podcast details key points to consider on why you should plan and how to plan.
In July of 2018, Oracle released a new subscription-based pricing model for Java SE (Standard Edition) and announced certain changes that went into effect in January of 2019. These licensing changes sparked confusion and widespread concern among customers. In this podcast, Erwann Couesbot touches some of the changes Oracle made, who in particular will be affected, and how organizations will be affected. For more information on Oracle’s updated Java licensing, read our recent blog: Using Java? Here’s How Oracle’s New 2019 Java Licensing Affects You.
Host: Erwann Couesbot: https://bit.ly/2WIKJdX
Oracle Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3C8PnSR
ServiceNow has long been known as an IT helpdesk but in recent years, they have evolved into much more than that. As they strive to become the ultimate digital transformation platform, they have made behavioral and licensing changes to drive adoption of new solutions and expand into lines of business outside of IT. In this podcast, Erik Bullard discusses ServiceNow’s land and expand strategy and what to watch out for prior to your next renewal. For more information on this topic, read our recent blog: ServiceNow ITSA Unlimited Customers: Beware of These Licensing Changes.
Host: Erik Bullard: https://bit.ly/2Voe4K6
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Still running SAP ECC? You’re not alone but with support ending in 2025, you’ll need to make a decision about where you’ll move to soon. Unfortunately, SAP hasn’t shared customer success and failure data pertaining to the S/4hana platform. So how do you know if S/4HANA is your best choice? In this podcast, Ted Rogers discusses what you should keep in mind when seriously considering a migration to S/4HANA. For more, read his recent blog: Migrating SAP S/4HANA Could Get You Fired. Not Deciding on S/4HANA Will Probably Get You Fired.
Host: Ted Rogers: https://bit.ly/2V7h1z3
Project Execution Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3xlw9px
Microsoft Q2 FY19 revenue reached $32.5B which once again represented double-digit revenue growth. Commercial Cloud revenue was $9B and grew an impressive 48%. Office 365, which is part of the Commercial Cloud revenue, grew 34%. This growth was primarily driven by a 27% growth in the number of seats as well as an increase in the revenue per Office 365 user. Revenue per Office 365 user increased as more enterprises migrated to higher value (and costly) E3 and E5 plans. Azure revenue is not reported but it grew 76%, which in a vacuum is impressive but sequentially this represents flat growth when it grew 98% back in Q2 FY18. Based on these results, you should fully expect Microsoft to continue to push enterprises to more robust Office 365 plans and promote the need to use Azure and the cloud bundle Microsoft 365, especially for Firstline Workers.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
ServiceNow had their strongest Q4 ever with $665M in subscription revenue, representing 33% growth. They closed 51 transactions in the quarter with over $1M in annual contract value (ACV). They now have 678 customers with over $1M in ACV, which represents 33% growth. ServiceNow is not only successfully selling their core IT products (ITSM, ITOM, ITBM, ITAM) but they are also having success with their emerging products (CSM, HR, Security Ops, Intelligent Apps). 31% of net new ACV was tied to emerging products, up from 25% last year. Expect ServiceNow to continue to focus on their current customer relationships to drive growth moving forward. They know that there is a large opportunity to continue to drive revenue through expansion of their products, adding new products, and increasing the use of what is already landed.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
ServiceNow Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/3ls6VDt
Google has announced that starting April 2, 2019, the pricing associated with Google's G Suite Basic and Business plans will increase by 20%. G Suite Enterprise pricing will not be affected by the planned increases. This is the first significant announcement made by Google Cloud since Thomas Kurian took over this year. Even though these increases will directly impact small to mid-size businesses they also have possible (and likely) ramifications for larger businesses that utilize or are considering adopting Google's G Suite Enterprise plan.
While Microsoft may want to overwhelm you with new products and solutions at NRF’s Big Show, don’t forget to leave with insight that is valuable to you. Definitely understand what is new and what is coming, but also prepare to ask the right questions of Microsoft.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
Microsoft Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/2V78ADX
NRF, the world’s largest retail conference, is coming up January 13-15. We fully expect Salesforce to spend a significant amount of time at the conference discussing new products and solutions. While it is good to gain an understanding of what is new and what is coming, it is also important to use this time to ask the right questions of Salesforce. Doing so can help set up your renewal negotiations and ultimately lead to getting more value from your Salesforce relationship.
Host: Adam Mansfield: https://bit.ly/3rPGp8r
SalesForce Commercial Advisory Services: https://bit.ly/37hFkMV
Salesforce had another stellar quarter, beating analysts’ expectations in its third-quarter earnings last night. Revenue is up 26% y-o-y and the Remaining Performance Obligation (RPO) is now at $21.2B, up 34%. The company raised FY 2019 guidance and expects 2020 revenue to reach $16B, expecting continued growth in cloud computing sales. Marc Benioff has even higher expectations for Q4, putting some pressure on co-CEO Keith Block. The strategic acquisition of Mulesoft, which was finalized in May, is already showing success with its ability to unlock data from legacy systems and accelerate digital transformation – a current focus for C-suite executives. Mulesoft helps power Customer 360, Salesforce’s multiconnected cloud product which combines Sales, Service, Einstein AI, and analytics into a single platform. This offering a competitive advantage for Salesforce which they will continue to push in order to increase product adoption.
In this podcast, our Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield covers what these Q3 results mean for customers and how they should approach their Salesforce relationship moving forward.
In September, Thomas Kurian took a leave of absence from Oracle after 22 years at the company. Just two months later, he joined Google as the head of cloud computing, heightening underlying tensions between the two companies that have been in an ongoing legal battle for the past 8 years. At Oracle, Kurian led cloud transition efforts but he and Larry Ellison reportedly had differences with respect to Oracle's Cloud vision. Ellison believed in a closed system while Kurian wanted to open up their cloud solutions and allow them to run on AWS, Google, etc. UpperEdge’s Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, discusses his first impressions and what he’ll be paying attention as this plays out.
Many organizations are enticed to move to Microsoft Office 365 or even Microsoft 365 by the belief that their cost profile would decrease and that their pricing would come with special one-time discounting. Too often, organizations later discover after closer examination that the discounting not only wasn’t special but it didn’t come with the proper downstream price protections. This is one reason too many Microsoft customers are faced with significant and unexpected price increases come renewal time. Before moving to one of Microsoft’s cloud products, it is critical you assess the true competitiveness of your discounting and ensure you have the proper price protections in place.
The sourcing and selection of your IT Services partner often spans over several months and requires significant time and effort from your cross-functional teams. Closing your services contract on time while preserving the complete integrity of your negotiated commercial construct requires a plan. You must maintain momentum throughout the process and execute an approach that helps mitigate the risks of unforeseen hurdles in a low-leverage environment.
Despite the upbeat and high-fiving tone of SAP’s Q3 2018 earnings call, analysts were not enthusiastic about SAP’s latest results. Although SAP reported 41% growth...
Microsoft had another strong quarter with earnings and revenue beating expectations. Commercial Cloud revenue is up 47% driven by Office 365 commercial revenue growth of 36%, Dynamics 365 grew 51% and Azure revenue is up 76%. Current and potential customers should expect Microsoft to continue to aggressively push adoption of their strategic cloud bundle, Microsoft 365, which includes Office 365, Windows 10, and Enterprise Mobility and Security. It is critical that all organizations ensure they have the proper downstream protections and the appropriate level of flexibility in place as Microsoft will look to increase revenue per user over time.
ServiceNow had another strong quarter. Subscription revenue was up an impressive 39% with 25 net new deals with over $1M in annual contract value. With the goal of landing more net new customers and upselling their current base, ServiceNow has changed their go-to-market approach. They now describe their product portfolio as the Now Platform and three (3) workflow clouds (IT, Employee Experience and Customer Service). ServiceNow will continue to rely heavily on their established CIO relationships and partner ecosystem to sell more ServiceNow products while also ramping up both their company and product brand awareness.
After attending Oracle OpenWorld sessions focused on Universal Credits and Bring Your Own License (BYOL), Oracle Practice Leader, Jeff Lazarto, shares what customers should know about these pricing options. Those considering these options should proceed with caution and take steps to ensure they are making the best choice for their organization before making a commitment.
Larry Ellison made some bold statements in his opening keynote at this year's OpenWorld conference. Oracle redid its entire cloud infrastructure and claims that this second generation cloud offering is very different and better than anything else out there. Ellison then spent a significant amount of time taking aim at Amazon's AWS. Listen to Oracle practice leader, Jeff Lazarto's quick recap for more opening keynote highlights.
Too many companies fail to negotiate the right cloud deal with their cloud vendor come renewal. Ultimately, the common culprit is simply poor preparation. Failing to allocate the necessary amount of time, relying to heavily on a perceived strong relationship, and being overly confident in your standard processes can all lead to an unfavorable cloud deal.
Back in April of this year, SAP finally provided some guidance on how it planned to address Indirect Access, or as SAP refers to it, “Digital Access,” for current and future customers. Specifically, they articulated three options for existing customers: Do Nothing, License Exchange or Contract Conversion. New customers would be licensed under the new model, measured by the 9 document types defined in the SAP ERP Pricing for the Digital Age.
Too many ServiceNow customers are starting to see a less accommodating and flexible ServiceNow. Especially when it comes time to renew their cloud subscription. Unexpected price increases being forced onto their customer base with contract terms that are less favorable than what have been in place previously are too common. It is critical that you prepare appropriately for these changes as you embark on your renewal negotiations.
Thomas Kurian's leave of absence results in him leaving Oracle altogether. According to various news outlets, the main reason for his leaving was due to a dispute with Larry Ellison over whether or not to allow Oracle's Cloud software to work with other Cloud software such as AWS and Azure.
It is very clear that, after attending the various product keynotes (Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Einstein Analytics..etc), Salesforce is going to be aggressively pushing the Customer Success Platform (Customer 360) and all the products it includes into as many customers’ ecosystems as they can and as quickly as they can.
Beyond the announcement of the new partnership with Apple and coverage of Einstein Voice, It is very clear that Salesforce wanted it to be known that they are completely focused on their Customer Success Platform. This focus will bring an aggressive sales organization pushing its customers to adopt more of the products and solutions that it encompasses.
It is an understatement to say that enterprises are severely impacted when their subscribed to cloud solutions are down and not available. Downtime issues can be disastrous and costly. While Service Level Agreements (SLAs) are a standard in cloud subscription agreements, they are often boilerplate that simply don’t cut it. Regardless of which cloud vendor your enterprise is relying on (Salesforce, Microsoft, Workday, ServiceNow, etc.), having the proper SLA structure in place with proper remedies for failure is critical.
With Oracle OpenWorld 2018 just weeks away, Oracle has posted Q1 FY19 earnings that lack luster and have missed Wall Street's expectations. In Q4 Oracle stopped breaking out its revenue streams so it's hard to tell where the company may be struggling with their various products and services. Oracle users aren't seeing a business case to migrate to their cloud solutions.
Oracle’s Thomas Kurian has taken a leave of absence from his role as Senior VP President of Product Strategy. It seems Kurian wants to make more of Oracle’s cloud software run on other cloud platforms such as Azure and AWS, where as Ellison wants everything to run on Oracle. Clients need to be aware of Oracle’s eventual strategy as they become accustomed to using Azure and AWS; they may or may not work with Oracle's software in the near future.
Workday had a very good Q2, their subscription revenue is up 30% YoY with record highs for renewals—in relation to original contract values. Customers should be prepared for Workday to up-sell you with new products and services come your renewal—in an effort to expand their footprint across your enterprise. More detail can be heard in this podcast.
Thomas Kurian, President of Product Development at Oracle is taking a leave of absence. Kurian has been at Oracle since 1996, in his email address to employees his leave hints at being more permanent than temporary, and with Oracle OpenWorld just weeks away, it can be assumed he will be absent for the event. Kurian was responsible for Oracle's move to the Cloud and with poor Cloud financials last quarter it could be speculated there's a correlation.
When defining what a business case is, consensus says it’s the reason for initiating a project or task. But UpperEdge’s Shawn Stamp says the real value of your business case goes far beyond project launch. A great business case should guide design decisions, manage scope, sustain alignment & momentum, and measure success.
Microsoft’s pricing and licensing changes will go into effect in October 2018 and many customers will be hit with significant price increases as a result. Microsoft claims these changes will “help customers compare solutions based on their organization’s need, not just price, accelerating their journey to modern commerce” but do they really have the customers’ best interest in mind? Here is a look at the real motivation behind these changes and how customers will be affected.
Though many companies have short-term needs or a current project in mind when selecting a vendor, the long-term viability of the cloud service provider (CSP) cannot be overlooked. While the CSP selected a few years ago may have been an economical or strategic decision at the time, that same CSP could be a challenge to integrate into your future environment and ultimately be a burden.
Wall Street expectations were surpassed, significant revenue growth across all of Salesforce’s clouds (i.e. Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Salesforce Platform & Other, and Marketing Cloud & Commerce Cloud) was achieved and FY19 guidance was raised. Based on the extent of coverage during the earnings call and what we are already seeing in the market, MuleSoft is going to be heavily pushed into meeting agendas with current Salesforce customers with the goal of getting customers to adopt MuleSoft as part of the overarching “Land and Expand” sales strategy that is already proving to be succesful.
Recently, our clients have shared with us how increasingly frustrated they are with their cloud vendor's behavior. In some cases, the vendor's aggressive approach has fractured the relationship and even influenced purchasing decisions. Have you experienced any of this upsetting behavior from your cloud vendor? !
With over 2,700 sessions to choose from, Salesforce’s massive conference can be overwhelming. But with the right approach, Dreamforce can be a valuable experience and can even be an opportunity to gain leverage at your next Salesforce renewal. Our tips will help you make the most of this year’s Salesforce conference.
Salesforce is approaching customers ahead of their renewals asking for additional purchases to help them meet their own quarterly goals. Beware of any changes to your price protections and conditions, the language is foggy and seems to be intended to protect Salesforce’s revenue more than customer needs. Whether you have been approached with these changes or not, we expect more customers to be confronted with these sales tactics soon. Rather than letting Salesforce make the discussion about how the customer can spend more, customers should be sure to keep the focus on their needs and the value they receive from Salesforce products.
ServiceNow had another strong quarter beating expectations and reporting significant subscription revenue growth. ServiceNow closed 28 deals in the quarter with an average contract value (“ACV”) of greater than $1M, bringing the total number of customers spending $1M or more annually to an impressive 575. ServiceNow is leveraging the widespread need to make successful digital transformations to elevate awareness of ServiceNow’s products within enterprises to the C-Suite and CEO. ServiceNow is focused on adding new customers but also understands that upsells represent greater opportunity. Whether you are considering ServiceNow for the first time or are already a customer, it is critical that you not only negotiate the proper upfront pricing but ensure you have the proper price protections and flexibility built into your contracts.
RP implementation projects are large, complex endeavors that can quickly spiral out of control. Blown budgets and delayed implementations are not uncommon, and in the...
Cloud renewals are an opportunity for companies to amend unfavorable terms and ensure they maintain a customer-centric relationship. However, too many companies miss these opportunities because they wrongfully believe they can approach their cloud renewal negotiations the same way their procurement team approaches negotiations when ordering supplies. Here are some of the most common cloud renewal negotiation mistakes we see organizations commit.
All too often we find ourselves engaged with prospective clients that decouple the negotiation of their SAP agreement from their System Implementation (SI) selection, evaluation and negotiation. Before de-coupling, consider these five tenets...
Oracle had a very interesting Q4 earnings release, which initially triggered a stock price increase during after-hours trading, only to be followed by a very...
Too many organizations are under the false impression that since their SaaS Cloud contract includes a renewal term price protection, then they don’t have to worry about any unbudgeted fee increases. But the truth is, there are conditions that often remove the protection you thought you had. When planning for your upcoming cloud renewal, be sure to understand the conditions that can negate your price certainty.
You run your business every day and your experience qualifies you for your role. But how often do you engage outside consulting firms? Do you have a mature set of processes for engaging external System Integration (SI) companies for large complex IT programs? And how will you determine the level of your participation in the implementation?
Oracle’s change in revenue reporting for Q4 raises concerns about the strength of its business and the quarterly success picture Oracle painted during its earnings call.
All cloud vendors work from a common playbook in order to grab market share and increase revenues. Knowing their blueprint for success will help your company achieve the best deal and structure the most optimal go-forward relationship.
Another strong quarter for Salesforce that included beating revenue expectations, 25% year-over-year total revenue growth, significant revenue growth across all clouds and raised full year guidance. Salesforce’s focus is clearly on providing its customers the best solution to drive digital transformation. Expect an aggressive sales organization selling Salesforce’s ability to provide the best solution for your organization to obtain the critical and coveted 360 degree customer view.
Due to the complexity at hand, Microsoft licensing changes typically fly under the radar. Microsoft’s aggressive sales tactics and increased focus on Azure are cause for more scrutiny. Listen to see how Microsoft’s May 2018 change is affecting the way that you pay for Azure services.
When planning for your upcoming Salesforce renewal, you need to understand the conditions that negate and remove the renewal term price protection found in Salesforce’s standard Master Subscription Agreement.
As you approach your negotiation with ServiceNow, whether you are a net-new customer or coming up to your renewal, it is important to understand the things that matter most to them. Knowing this and how to most effectively use it, will help increase your leverage and ensure you not only pay the right price but have the proper level of flexibility and downstream price protections in place.
Microsoft continues to aggressively push customers into the cloud. Microsoft is approaching their base of customers that have already adopted Office 365 with renewal proposals that include enticing offers to get them to jump into their cloud bundle Microsoft 365, which includes Office 365, Windows 10 and Enterprise Mobility + Security . They do this even when a business case for Enterprise Mobility + Security (1/3 of the bundle) has yet to be made. Don’t let the offered “special” upfront discount alone get you or your organization to jump, too often there are serious consequences in doing so.
SAP recently announced completion of “an over year-long journey of collaboration with user groups, customers, industry analysts and other stakeholders, to develop a first of its kind outcome-based pricing model for Indirect Access. Len Riley breaks down what this means for SAP customers.
Microsoft’s impressive revenue growth has been fueled by increased cloud adoption. Microsoft understands that future revenue growth will continue to be driven by their ability to convince their customers to migrate to the cloud while adding more cloud solutions to their portfolio. Microsoft will continue to push their cloud solutions as necessities for organizations hoping to achieve their digital transformation objectives.
ServiceNow’s Q1 subscription revenue grew and impressive 40% year-over-year reaching $543M. ServiceNow is focused on becoming a trusted strategic technology partner for their customers. They are no longer interested in selling just their core product, IT Service Management (ITSM) to get in the door. ServiceNow wants multiple product adoption including other IT products like ITOM and perhaps more importantly emerging products like Customer Service Management (CSM).
This webinar will explore:
• Fundamental differences in contracting agile vs more traditional waterfall programs • 18 structural risks of agile at scale projects • How to use the contract to transfer and mitigate Agile at scale risks • Useful measures of vendor performance and accountability for Agile at scale programs • Basics of incentive structures of Agile at scale contracts • Useful measures of vendor performance and accountability for Agile at scale programs • Basics of incentive structures of Agile at scale contracts
Other revenues for Google, which includes Google Cloud, were $4.4B -- up 36% year-over year. Impressive revenue growth was driven by Google's ability to sign significantly larger and more strategic deals for Cloud within the quarter. G-Suite revenue growth acceleration is attributed to Google's perceived ability to now serve all the needs of a large enterprise. Expect Google to aggressively attempt to displace Microsoft customers, especially those that are just now considering adopting Office 365.
Has your organization accepted the standard uptime SLA and SLA credit structure found within your cloud vendor's master subscription agreement? An uptime SLA is of little value if it does not come with a meaningful credit or penalty structure. Most cloud vendor's standard penalty structures are not sufficient, let alone meaningful.
Too many enterprises are making the decision to adopt a particular software because they got a “special” discounted price from the software vendor. Not only is the discounted price typically not the best the software vendor could do, often the final deal is missing many other critical terms and protections.
Salesforce can be tough as nails when it comes to their contract negotiations. As part of their goal to reach $20 billion in revenue by 2022, Salesforce is unrelenting and tends to dictate terms rather than concede to their customer’s needs. If this sounds bleak, one thing to remember is that Salesforce makes the rules, and thus has the ability to bend them. Knowing what they are willing to bend, and by how much, is critical to your negotiation.
Mainstream support for SAP’s ECC platform is set to expire in 2025, driving companies to make the conversion to SAP S/4 HANA. This webcast will provide valuable insights on the following: • SAP's 2020 Ambitions • Defining The S/4 HANA Journey • Next Generation SAP Agreement • Recommended Path Forward
Though you often hear about how customers benefit from switching to Cloud services, the incentives that drive companies like Oracle into becoming a Cloud service provider (CSP) aren't as well known. So, why has the Cloud become a priority for Oracle? What's in it for them? What are the implications for customers?
Salesforce released their Q4 and Full Year earnings on February 28th. They eclipsed the $10B annual run rate milestone. Their success is tied to the strategic relationships they are forming with customers focused on digital transformation. They now have more customers with larger and longer term contracts that include multiple cloud solutions. Salesforce has their sights set on becoming a $20B company and they will be relying on their customer base to get them there.
This podcast will provide valuable insights, including: • Outlining how to effectively prepare for your Microsoft renewal • Providing actionable strategies to increase your leverage with Microsoft • Techniques to counter Microsoft’s sales tactics come renewal time
With Oracle's fiscal year-end coming up on May 31st, it's the perfect time to go over this checklist so you are prepared when Oracle's sales team approaches your organization. Jeff Lazarto highlights a few items in this podcast which is covered in-depth in his blog on this topic.
Microsoft’s overall revenue grew 12% year over year reaching $28.9B. Microsoft’s growth was primarily driven by Microsoft’s success in the cloud. Most specifically, Office 365 commercial revenue grew an impressive 41% and Azure revenue grew an astronomical 98%. Microsoft knows that future success will be tied directly to their ability to expand the average revenue per user (ARPU) through migrating more enterprises to the most robust cloud offerings (i.e. Office 365 E5 and Microsoft 365 E5). All enterprises need to prepare appropriately.
Greg Hall, Director of IT Services at UpperEdge, discusses ways to improve the value you provide to your organization, he's compiled a list of 6 resolutions you can commit to that will enhance the strategic value of your procurement services.
In a recent analyst meeting, CTO and Co-Founder Parker Harris, presented revenue plans to reach $40B by 2028 and $60B by 2034. Adam Mansfield, @Adam_Mansfield_ tells you what you need to know in this podcast.
Jeff Lazarto, Oracle Commercial Advisory Practice leader reports on Oracle's 2018 Earnings and what a shortfall in their cloud earnings could mean for your next negotiation strategy.
Jeff Lazarto, Oracle Commercial Advisory Practice leader, intros his blog Making Smarter IT Partner Selection focusing on the "3 Cs", capabilities, cultural and commercial. Successful teams have found them helpful to have an overall evaluation structure that allows them to conceptualize the process and compartmentalize all the information received during the evaluation.
If you are considering adding Salesforce to your supplier portfolio or are already a customer, this webcast will provide many valuable insights, including:
• Outlining how to effectively prepare for your SFDC renewal • Providing actionable strategies to increase your leverage with SFDC • Addressing SFDC’s sales tactics come renewal time
John Belden, UpperEdge's Project Execution Services Advisory Leader, talks about the increase in CIOs adopting agile methods across their business project portfolios.
Greg Hall, Director, IT Service & Commercial Advisory Practice, discusses maintenance renewals; over 80% are based on the calendar year. The window for companies to avoid OPEX increases and drive down TCO is in full swing and quickly closing.
Adam Mansfield, Director of Services at UpperEdge reports on Microsoft's Q1 FY2018 earnings and what the key takeaways are for Microsoft clients.
Shawn Stamp, UpperEdge's Director of Project Execution & Advisory Services: When it comes to implementing SAP or Oracle, putting together a winning team can seem just as challenging. It’s no secret that ERP-based, transformational business initiatives are complex undertakings that are prone to delays, blown budgets, and/or outright failure.
Adam Mansfield, Director of IT Services at UpperEdge evaluates Salesforce's Q2'17 Earnings.
• Uncover Oracle’s cloud transformation strategy • Provide insights on what Oracle’s evolving customer approach and sales team compensation policies mean for you • Detail the tactics Oracle is using to generate sales opportunities • Prepare you for Oracle’s approach and enhance your negotiation leverage
UpperEdge's Director of Services / Microsoft Commercial Advisory Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield discusses Microsofts Q4 Earnings and what they mean for Microsoft's customers for upcoming licensing renewals.
Adam Mansfield, UpperEdge's Microsoft Practice Lead discusses the layoff of 4000 Microsoft employees mostly within their sales organization. Learn how Microsofts focus on Cloud services could impact Microsofts approach to your renewal.
In the wake of Anheuser-Busch and Diageo's cases vs. SAP, UpperEdge's CEO, David Blake and SAP Practice Lead, Len Riley answer the top 6 questions weighing on the minds of CIO's regarding SAP's indirect access.
In an ideal scenario, the benefits of an established relationship with your AMS (Application Management Services) provider should be evident. A mature relationship should drive...
The real reason Microsoft synchronized O365 and Windows 10's upgrade schedule.... for their Secure Productive Enterprise adoption strategy.
Microsoft’s revenue reached $23.56B, which was just short of the expected $23.62. But what’s a mere $60M delta when you’ve achieved your primary goal of posting strong growth in your key Office and Azure cloud computing segments?
Topics covered during the podcast include: • SAP’s approach to indirect access and enforcement • Real world customer scenarios of indirect use • Significance of the SAP v. Diageo case • Downstream implications of HANA • Best practice approaches for assessing and mitigating your indirect use risk
UpperEdge Governance & Risk Practice Lead, John Belden and CEO David Blake discuss what this critical success factor is and how you can hold your IT consulting partner more accountable to enabling your program’s success.