How to Choose an Oracle Licensing Consultant: 10 Questions

The short answer: choose an Oracle licensing consultant who earns nothing from Oracle. That means no reselling, no implementation partnership and no fee tied to settling non-compliance. They should know Oracle’s contracts and policies in detail, have the technical skill to read the data themselves, and have a record of reducing claims. The ten questions below test each point. They come from what we have seen in more than 260 engagements since 2015.

Selecting an Oracle licence management consultant can be hard. These are the questions and pointers to put to any consultant or firm. If you are looking for one now, see our Oracle licensing consultants.

1. Is the consultant or firm an Oracle licence reseller?

Oracle resellers often offer software asset management (SAM) services, but their main business is selling more licences. That conflicts with giving unbiased advice on optimisation and compliance.

• An incentive to find non-compliance. Resellers often earn commission on the licences they sell. That can push them to find non-compliance, even minor or debatable issues, to justify a purchase.
• Informing Oracle. A reseller’s relationship with Oracle can lead to non-compliance reaching Oracle, which can trigger costly audits and licence demands.

2. Is the consultant or firm an Oracle implementation partner?

Many Oracle implementation partners offer licence management services alongside their main work. Like resellers, they stress that they can help clients understand licence use and optimise deployments.

The conflict comes from the partner relationship itself. Implementation partners rely on Oracle for projects, technical support and help with configuration. That makes it hard to give unbiased licensing advice while keeping a strong relationship with Oracle.

3. Does the consultant negotiate on Oracle’s behalf or promise you a “good price” from Oracle?

A new kind of “compliance specialist” has appeared in recent years. They do not sell licences directly but work through other Oracle partners or the open market model. Their main income comes from resolving non-compliance.

They may say they are independent, but there are good reasons for caution. These specialists may be the most dangerous of all the firms with a relationship with Oracle:

• An incentive to find non-compliance. Their income depends on finding it, even when the issue is minor or debatable, so that it can be settled.
• Opaque relationships. Their ties to Oracle can be complex and unclear, which raises questions about their influence and their access to sensitive compliance information.

Check their track record, their references and their relationship with Oracle before you rely on their advice.

4. Will the consultant keep your compliance matters confidential?

Compliance audits are sensitive and should not be made public. Naming a customer is one thing. Publishing who was audited, what was found or what was paid is another, and we never do it. A good consultant protects you from:

• Breaches of confidence. Publicising audit details erodes trust and can break confidentiality agreements.
• Targeted audits. Highlighting past compliance issues can draw attention from Oracle or other publishers and lead to follow-up audits.
• Misrepresentation. Compliance matters are complex. A simplified public story can misrepresent what happened and harm the customer’s reputation.

5. Does the consultant have the skill for accurate Oracle licence discovery?

An accurate Oracle licence review means working through complex usage and the gap between what was intended and what is actually used. Oracle features can be switched on without anyone meaning to, and each can have a licensing cost. That is why the consultant’s expertise matters.

Tools give useful installation and usage data, but they rarely give a final compliance answer, because:

• Every environment is different. Deployment configuration, disaster recovery and cloned development and test instances all change the answer.
• The data needs forensic analysis. Usage data and configuration settings have to be read carefully to find real non-compliance.
• Features depend on each other. The links between features make it hard to isolate the licence impact by automated means alone.

A skilled consultant puts the usage data in the context of your environment, finds features switched on by accident, and assesses the real risk.

6. Does the consultant understand Oracle’s licensing policies and contracts?

Any contract is hard to understand. With Oracle, the number of contracts, agreements, licensing guides and non-contractual documents makes it especially complex. See Oracle contracts and agreements.

Oracle licence audits and compliance reviews are not truly collaborative. The effort of Oracle’s audit and sales teams goes into finding breaches of the licence agreement, and then into making you pay for them. The biggest mistake organisations make is not understanding their own licensing obligations and rights.

Your consultant should be able to guide you through the finest details of an Oracle agreement, and know both Oracle’s past and current licensing policies.

7. Does the consultant understand Oracle’s business practices?

After the contracts, Oracle’s business practices are the next big factor in a licence audit. They vary from market to market. Oracle negotiations are often rushed and tense, with pressure from sales and audit staff.

This is where your consultant’s experience counts. They should know Oracle’s practices closely and help you set the pace of the negotiation instead of following Oracle’s.

8. What is the consultant’s record in licence optimisation?

Oracle licence management is about two things: compliance and optimisation. Optimisation means both remediating non-compliant deployments and rebalancing the architecture so that it needs fewer licences.

Your consultant needs to be a technologist who understands licensing and contracts. For examples, see what Oracle licensing costs and where the savings come from.

9. What is the consultant’s stand on reducing Oracle’s non-compliance claims?

Every Oracle licensing consultant says it reduces costs. The results differ, because of each consultant’s relationship with Oracle and its working principles.

We have had many engagements where we reduced the non-compliance claim to zero or close to it. Our principles are:

• Oracle is entitled to every contractual claim that is accurate.
• Inadvertent use should be treated differently from deliberate non-compliance, and data analysis can prove it was inadvertent.

Find out whether the consultant is more interested in finding non-compliance to report to Oracle, or in reducing yours. See how we work in Oracle licence audit defence.

10. References

This seems obvious, but it can conflict with keeping audit details confidential. We advise customers to speak to other customers who have worked with a consultant. They can give you honest feedback on the consultant’s ability and working ethics.

Questions we are asked about choosing an Oracle licensing consultant

Should an Oracle licensing consultant be independent of Oracle?

Yes. A consultant who sells Oracle licences, implements Oracle software or earns from settling non-compliance has a reason to find problems rather than reduce them.

What should an Oracle licensing consultant deliver?

A clear effective licence position: what you own, what you use, the gap, and how to close it at the lowest cost, backed by data that will stand up in an audit.

Is Rythium independent?

Yes. We have no partnership with any software publisher, and we do not sell licences. See our Oracle licensing consultants page for what we do.