Currently, operation of companies is entirely dependent on information and communication technologies (ICT) which are used across all indfustries. There are bigger demands that are placed on the management of individual assets, while software is the most problematic from this perspective. It is necessary for companies to pay sufficient attention to this issue, because there is a high risk of financial penalties in case of its failure. The first objective of this thesis is to provide basic characteristics of Software Asset Management (SAM) belonging to Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), which is one of the few adressing this area in an entirely way. This objective is default condition for achieving the second objective, where will be analyzed specific case of software asset management in the banking sector. On the basis of the analysis will be accepted proposals for implemention of best practises of SAM. The third objective is enrichment of previous proposals by parts of request for proposal, which are focused on detailed specification of the required functionality of software tools according to SAM. The all tasks will be achieved through the study of relevant sources and through techniques that help with analysis and definition of the future state. The benefits of thesis are in to identification of gaps within software asset management, which obtained through employee survey. The second contribution is to propose changes in the form of specific steps that should help to bring more efficiency to the current state. The last contribution is to summarise new pieces of knowledge, which are extending this issue by information focused on large organisations.

Business Agility could be the means to survive in a competitive environment of continuous andunanticipated change and to respond quickly to rapidly changing, fragmenting global markets that are catered by competitors. To leverage the potential benefits of Business Agility, many companies use Information Technology as a major force for augmenting their agility. The topic of increasing Business Agility through Information Technology has been pervasively studied in research papers. And in the context of this thesis, we will investigate research papers in order to develop an evaluation model for facilitating making informed decisions regarding agile Information Systems in computational Grid environments. The Information Systems in this thesis will focus on license management systems, which is an intricate but coherently integrated blend of many different modules compiled as a technical solution that enables software license management. We will use our evaluation model to compare license management frameworks, easily grasped as a draft for a license management system, for Grid environments and also underpin it with a case study on an in-use license management system in order to strengthen its business applicability. The research was conducted as a qualitative comparison and a case study, combining both research papers and a real business context in order to fulfill the goals and purposes of this thesis. The results of the analysis implies that most of the license management frameworks for Grid environments lacks various details needed for making a feasible implementation in a certain business context, whilst those that have been trialed in a real business situation fulfilled almost every aspect of our evaluation model. The conclusion drawn is that our evaluation model is a seemingly good start for making informed decisions when choosing or designing an agile license management system for Grid environments

This thesis is describing a business strategy of how to license a software product. The licenses discussed in this thesis are called open source licenses. The open source licenses have gained much attention lately by companies such as Microsoft, IBM, and Sun Microsystems. The reason for this is that some products considered being open source software are very widely used. These products include the most popular web server, the Apache web server, with more than 60% market share. 25% of the installed operating systems that are running Apache and other web servers are installed with Linux as operating system, which is also considered as open source software. These are only two examples of popular products that are considered as open source software products. These products are choices for many people and companies when choosing software to use, for example NASA. Open source licenses are called open in the way that the software is shipped not only in binary form, but also with the source code that can be modified and recompiled to suit the buyer’s need better. Apache web server and the Linux operating system are free for download, install, run and modify to suit your needs. In this thesis I will discuss whether these licenses can increase the chance of developing a successful product or not, in terms of market shares. / Affärsmodeller kring öppen källkod diskuteras i denna magisteruppats. Det finns ett flertal programvaror byggd på öppen källkod som kan betraktas som framgångsrika om man avser antal användare eller hur stora marknadsandelar produkterna har. Diskussionen i magister uppsatsen kretsar därför om man kan öka sina chanser att utveckla framgångsrika produkter genom att använda sig av öppen källkod främst ur ett företags perspektiv som har vinstintresse. / Mats Nilsson Kabelgatan 13D 414 57 Göteborg

<p>Arguably, the Schumpeterian ideology of “creative destruction” saying that eventually even the most secure monopoly will be destroyed by a new technology, a new idea, or a shift in tastes could be applied to open source software. Currently, the proprietary software holds a strong position in the software market. Nevertheless, one could see a surge in articles and acceptance among organisations concerning open source software.</p><p>Proprietary software companies like Microsoft are still gaining ground within the Swedish municipalities. Although one get the impression that municipalities generally are positive toward open source software, the decision-making process often results in choosing a proprietary software alternative. However, one could question which are the underlying factors and to what extent are these factors affecting the decision-making process of municipalities integrating or migrating into open source software?</p><p>In order to study this phenomenon, we chose a quantitative approach using a questionnaire as the tool for data gathering. The sample consisted of 100 randomly selected municipalities. A pre study was made through an interview in order to strengthen the accuracy of the questionnaire which later on was sent out to the IT manager at each municipality in the sample.</p><p>The organisational-, environmental-, user- and system level are four main factors affecting the decision-making process concerning open source software. Among these, the organisational factor was the only one which had a significant negative impact on the decision-making process concerning open source software. The importance of being able to integrate different software increases the need for compatibility which, according to the IT managers, is facilitated using a standardized software environment offered by for example Microsoft.</p>

Diploma thesis Design of software asset management tasks is focused on area of software asset management in business sector. In a time of still accelerating development of information and communication technologies is Software asset management (SAM) important component of ICT business management. Financial risks of failure to comply licensing terms or rules of licensing often exceed the value of owned software. However, the essence of SAM is not only in eliminating the financial risks, but also in enhancing ICT security or gaining competitive advantage while respecting the SAM principles. Main goal of this thesis is to analyze software asset management and design tasks to reference model of ICT management MBI. This theses is divided into two parts. First part characterizes SAM, licensing and related topics. First part is based on specialized sources and information from literary research. The output is a comprehensive summary of this issue, which serves as theoretical base for next part of this thesis. Second part is devoted to designing the task of Software asset management, the task of Software audit and defining its links to other objects in the MBI model. Furthermore, this thesis creates new objects like roles, methods or documents. Second part is based on theoretical base which was created in the first part and from consultations with IT field experts. The outputs are tasks which are implemented in the MBI model. Goal is fulfilled after creating these outputs. The benefits of this thesis are mostly the tasks extending MBI model and offering best practice for software asset management and software audit. Outcomes of this thesis should help users of reference model and IT community in general.

Dans le Cloud, peu de travaux traitent de l’analyse de l’usage réel et dynamique des logiciels consommés afin de déterminer les coûts réels engendrés et le respect des droits acquis auprès des fournisseurs de ces ressources. L’émergence de la pratique du Software Asset Management (SAM) traduit pourtant la préoccupation grandissante des industriels et des ‘Telcos’ (Entreprises de télécommunications) face à la complexité des modèles de licences dans des environnements virtualisés qui bouleversent nos usages de logiciel.La réponse des éditeurs de logiciel est souvent une incitation à ne plus suivre la consommation de licences, par le biais de contrats onéreux de consommation illimitée, rendant impossible une politique de maîtrise des coûts. Pour les utilisateurs finaux comme pour les fournisseurs de services cloud, il devient impératif de maîtriser et d’optimiser le déploiement des licences dans le Cloud.L’objectif devient celui de maitriser les besoins logiciels, au plus proche du temps réel, puis de générer des scénarii d’optimisation basés sur l’évolution de la consommation en modélisant les coûts réels afférents. Cela représente un levier de gains considérables pour tous les acteurs du cycle de vie du logiciel.Le contexte d’étude couvre l’ensemble du scope du Cloud (applications, plateformes, infrastructures et réseaux). Les travaux présentés ici s’attache à reconstituer tout le cycle de vie du logiciel, de l’achat jusqu’à la désinstallation, en intégrant les contraintes liées à sa nature ou à son usage. Nous proposons de résoudre le verrou majeur de l’identification du logiciel et de ses droits d’usage par la création et le suivi d’un tag.Nous proposons également une modélisation innovante s’appuyant sur une base de données graphe qui permet d’intégrer l’instantanéité des changements de configuration, de prendre en compte les différentes responsabilités impliquées par les niveaux de services offerts, tout en offrant la souplesse nécessaire pour supporter à la fois des modèles de licence classiques, ou à l’usage.Deux cas d’usages seront envisagés pour juger de la pertinence des modèles proposés : la gestion des licences dans un contexte de Plateforme as a Service (PaaS) et dans un cas de virtualisation de réseau (NFV). / Bout Cloud, only few works deals with dynamic and real usage analyse of deployed software in order to determine the true related costs, and licensing compliance with acquired rights from the software editors.However, the emergence of Software Asset Management (SAM) shows the growing concerns of the industry and carriers facing the licensing model complexity especially in virtualized environments where the software usage is disrupted.Editor’s answer consists in proposing to stop following this consumption via very expensive illimited-usage contracts. It makes impossible implementation of true cost management policies. For final users like for cloud service providers, it is crucial to manage and optimize license deployment in cloud environments.The aim is first to control Software need, as close as possible to real time, then to generate optimization scenario based on consumption evolution by cost modelization.It represents a valuable saving leverage and may let spring up new licensing model, more profitable for each software lifecycle’s stakeholders.Usage context covers all scope of Cloud (application, infrastructure and network). Our works propose to rebuild the Software life-cycle, from procurement to deinstallation, encompassing the constraints of it nature and usages. We propose to solve software identification issue by creation and monitoring of tags.Additionally, we propose an innovative modeling based on a graph database which allows instant integration of configuration changes, to take into account the different level of responsibility induced by the different level of granted services. It offers enough flexibility to handle classical licensing models as use-based model which are often more attractive for cloud-users.Two use-cases will be developed to evaluate our models ‘efficiency : the software licensing management in PaaS (Plateform as a Service) context and in NFV environments (Network Function Virtualization).

Arguably, the Schumpeterian ideology of “creative destruction” saying that eventually even the most secure monopoly will be destroyed by a new technology, a new idea, or a shift in tastes could be applied to open source software. Currently, the proprietary software holds a strong position in the software market. Nevertheless, one could see a surge in articles and acceptance among organisations concerning open source software. Proprietary software companies like Microsoft are still gaining ground within the Swedish municipalities. Although one get the impression that municipalities generally are positive toward open source software, the decision-making process often results in choosing a proprietary software alternative. However, one could question which are the underlying factors and to what extent are these factors affecting the decision-making process of municipalities integrating or migrating into open source software? In order to study this phenomenon, we chose a quantitative approach using a questionnaire as the tool for data gathering. The sample consisted of 100 randomly selected municipalities. A pre study was made through an interview in order to strengthen the accuracy of the questionnaire which later on was sent out to the IT manager at each municipality in the sample. The organisational-, environmental-, user- and system level are four main factors affecting the decision-making process concerning open source software. Among these, the organisational factor was the only one which had a significant negative impact on the decision-making process concerning open source software. The importance of being able to integrate different software increases the need for compatibility which, according to the IT managers, is facilitated using a standardized software environment offered by for example Microsoft.

The subject of this thesis is open source software and free software in term of utilization for business. The goal is to provide conditions and areas suitable for using of open source software and free software. The theoretical part gives basic terms, a list of organizations active in this area, classification of free software and a comparison of particular free software licenses. The practical part includes results of two inquiries of free software using: 1) personally made inquiry in Czech firms, 2) Internet inquiry of users. Further, a search of available free programmes has been made -- in term of utilization. The main benefit of the work is an evaluation of business opportunities for free software in particular utilization areas and determination of business models suitable for them. In the framework of this work, the author made an Internet portal on free software - to make the results of the work and external sources available to the public.

Le présent mémoire a pour ambition d'analyser la nature juridique et les particularismes du contrat de progiciel. Dans une première partie, nous examinerons les obligations mises à la charge des parties puis nous tenterons de qualifier le contrat de progiciel au regard du droit civil. Dans une seconde partie, nous examinerons la formation du contrat de progiciel dans un environnement traditionnel puis dans les environnements électroniques. Nous aborderons plus particulièrement deux nouveaux modes de formation des contrats, que sont les mécanismes du «shrink-wrap» et du «click-wrap». Nous analyserons ensuite les clauses limitatives ou exonératoire de garantie et de responsabilité, la clause d'élection de for et les clauses relatives à la propriété intellectuelle. / This thesis is intended to analyse the nature and the particularities of software license package contracts. Firstly, the obligations of each party will be studied, after which it shall be endeavoured to qualify the software license package contract with regard to civil law. Secondly, the creation of the software license package contract in a generalised situation as well as in an electronic environment will be examined. Furthermore, two new methods of contract creation will be contemplated, namely the "shrink-wrap" and the "click-wrap" methods. Finally, clauses limiting or exonerating responsibilities and guaranties, the de for election clause and clauses in relation to intellectual property will be analysed.

Le présent mémoire a pour ambition d'analyser la nature juridique et les particularismes du contrat de progiciel. Dans une première partie, nous examinerons les obligations mises à la charge des parties puis nous tenterons de qualifier le contrat de progiciel au regard du droit civil. Dans une seconde partie, nous examinerons la formation du contrat de progiciel dans un environnement traditionnel puis dans les environnements électroniques. Nous aborderons plus particulièrement deux nouveaux modes de formation des contrats, que sont les mécanismes du «shrink-wrap» et du «click-wrap». Nous analyserons ensuite les clauses limitatives ou exonératoire de garantie et de responsabilité, la clause d'élection de for et les clauses relatives à la propriété intellectuelle. / This thesis is intended to analyse the nature and the particularities of software license package contracts. Firstly, the obligations of each party will be studied, after which it shall be endeavoured to qualify the software license package contract with regard to civil law. Secondly, the creation of the software license package contract in a generalised situation as well as in an electronic environment will be examined. Furthermore, two new methods of contract creation will be contemplated, namely the "shrink-wrap" and the "click-wrap" methods. Finally, clauses limiting or exonerating responsibilities and guaranties, the de for election clause and clauses in relation to intellectual property will be analysed.