Sub-Capacity FAQs

Since July 18, 2011, Sub-capacity terms have been included in the base IBM Passport Advantage agreement. Customers may find the related terms in the Full Capacity and Virtualization Requirements section.

Since the inception of the Passport Advantage Sub-Capacity offering, IBM has continually made new server virtualization technologies eligible to participate in this flexible option. Refer to the Announcement tab of this FAQ web site for additional history. IBM will continue that strategy, announcing additional eligible virtualization environments through a variety of means. When possible, such announcements will be made through the normal announcement letter process. But given the fast changing virtualized server technology market, in order to be notified when IBM License Metric Tool support for additional eligible virtualization technologies become available, customers will need to subscribe to "My Notifications" (instructions are in a separate FAQ below). They should also monitor the Eligible Virtualization Technology(PDF, 40KB) exhibit for additions.

Yes, we continue to enhance our sub-capacity offering by making additional virtualization environments eligible, when we can ensure that we have the ability to monitor these environments and articulate the virtualization license counting rules. IBM will continue to evaluate additional server virtualization technologies based on customer demand and market presence.

New sub-capacity customers are required to implement IBM License Metric Tool (ILMT) within 90 days of their first Eligible Sub-Capacity Product deployment on an Eligible Virtualization Environment.
Existing sub-capacity customers should promptly upgrade to new versions, releases or modifications when they are made available per Full Capacity and Virtualization Requirements section of IPAA. Note that IBM intentionally does not prescribe a specific period of time for this term to accommodate various customer sizes. The intent is for customers to imply as soon as possible given their specific IT framework.

The use of IBM License Metric Tool is recommended for Full Capacity core-based environments,and is mandatory for use with sub-capacity licensing. As of May 1, 2023, exceptions to this requirement will no longer be accepted. Customers who previously reported manually due to the exceptions offered in prior versions of IPPA will be honored. Those exceptions were:

1. when ILMT does not yet provide support for the Eligible Virtualization Environment
   Note: In order to be notified when ILMT support for eligible virtualization technologies become available, customers need to subscribe to "My Notifications"
2. if your Enterprise has fewer than 1,000 employees and contractors, you are not a Service Provider (an entity that provides information technology services for end user customers, either directly or through a reseller), and you have not contracted with a Service Provider to manage your environment, and the total physical capacity of your Enterprise servers measured on a full capacity basis, but licensed under Sub-Capacity Licensing terms, is less than 1,000 PVUs.
3. if your servers are licensed to full capacity.

With the release of IPPA v11, manual exceptions are no longer accepted. Unsupported technologies must be accounted for via Full Capacity licensing. If you wish to take advantage of sub-capacity licensing, you must use a supported virtualization technology. If you were previously eligible to report manually, until January 1, 2024, you may refer to the guidance for your eligible virtualization technology and manual tracking spreadsheet example available from Sub-capacity webpage.

If the increase to full capacity is temporary in nature, then ILMT should continue to monitor that server and its partitions. If the increase to full capacity is permanent, ILMT would not be required -- however, IBM would recommend that the server and its partitions continue to be monitored by ILMT, especially if that server leverages an eligible virtualization technology since even "permanent" configurations can be changed, perhaps without the asset manager's knowledge.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

The sub-capacity terms reflect quarterly reporting as the maximum amount of time allowed before having to analyze, reconcile, and sign the ILMT reports. Most customers will probably need to perform this effort on a monthly basis, thus the default setting. Some customers, with very dynamic server environments, where partitions are resized/moved frequently and/or with changes in their software inventory, may need to create weekly reports in order to keep up with the volume of change. Only customers with the most stable of virtualized server environments would be able to maintain compliance with IBM licensing terms by doing quarterly reports.

Compared to relatively more stable, full capacity licensed server environments, IBM assumes much more risk in allowing the flexibility of licensing its software on a sub-capacity basis in virtualized server environments, where processor core capacity can be changed on the fly. IBM requires ILMT for the sub-cap offering to help customers maintain their compliance with IBM licensing terms.
However, ILMT only provides the data -- the customer must then analyze, reconcile, and create reports that document their on-going compliance. IT Asset Management is a financial discipline and the process of creating these reports is very similar in concept to analyzing, reconciling, and creating financial reports for a customer's accounting ledgers. For example, the initial reports generated by ILMT during the analysis/reconciliation effort could be considered similar to the effort to create a "trial balance".
Poor IT Asset Management may result in understated expenses and overstated profits -- a concern for any company's senior management.

Yes, a Business Partner or service provider may be able to assist a customer with license compliance. Many Passport Advantage resellers offer license management as a value-added service. However, the entity that owns the license entitlement (end-user customers in this example) is ultimately responsible for ensuring compliance with sub-capacity terms. In other words, customers may delegate, but they cannot abdicate this responsibility.

Yes, per the License Verification of the Passport Advantage or Passport Advantage Express Agreements, IBM has the right to audit customers.

It is the customer’s responsibility to maintain compliance with sub-capacity terms and conditions. IBM retains the right to audit a customer’s use of IBM software products to verify compliance. Each customer's situation is unique and the audit approach will be adapted to assess compliance specific to those environments.

An increase in the maximum or peak processor core capacity, as measured in cores, available to the IBM software requires additional license entitlements. IBM's licensing terms require that customers obtain additional entitlements prior to increasing the processor core capacity available to the software. ILMT monitors for changes in processor core capacity and reports this so that customers can ensure that they have obtained sufficient entitlements to cover these "high water marks". IBM licensing terms do not allow for averaging processor core capacity nor do the terms offer any grace periods for temporary spikes in workload.

No, IBM licensing terms do not provide for a grace period in order to "true-up". In addition, core-based licensing terms are not based on "usage". Both full and sub-capacity licensing terms requires the maximum (peak) processor core capacity for the server(full) or partition (sub-cap) prior to deployment or increase in that capacity. The IBM License Metric Tool monitors the customer's virtualized server environment on a continuous basis and reports back this "high water mark" in cores (by licensed metric) by software product, by partition. This allows he customer to compare the ILMT report output product totals to their inventory of license PoEs to confirm their compliance.

Such an increase occurs whenever you increase the maximum processor core capacity (measured in cores) available to the software, when the number of processor cores running the machine or partition is increased beyond entitlements, or when you make the software available to (i.e. install in) another partition on the server.

After logging into My Notifications with your IBM ID, type "License Metric" into the Product Lookup bar, then find 'IBM License Metric Tool' among the listed products and check subscribe button.
If you do not have an IBM ID, visit My Account Profile.