Throughout this decade, software companies have employed a number of tactics to enhance profitability. However, the most consistent and pervasive method has been to extract supplementary funds from existing customers. The most effective approach within this sub-category of revenue generation relies on the presumption that a large percentage of customers fail to properly manage their software licenses and are vulnerable to the dreaded software audit.
This survey, a follow-up to a similar study in 2023, demonstrates through anonymous data collection and interviews that many software customers are woefully unprepared. There are more overall audits, and the audits are occurring with greater frequency. The audits cost more to conduct. The audits result in customers being required to pay more to their vendors. And responding to an audit takes longer and requires the assignment of more resources both in terms of physical resources and personnel.