Atlassian – Ende des Supports für „Server“-Lizenzen: Was sind die Alternativen?

As of February 15, 2024, Atlassian will end support for "Server" licenses. A switch to data center licensing or to the cloud is associated with a huge increase in costs. What alternatives exist for Atlassian customers and what options an Enterprise License Agreement (ELA) offers is examined in more detail in this blog post.

For a long time, only "server" licenses were offered. These are classic purchase licenses with annual maintenance. The installation can take place on own systems or also with external providers. The support for server licenses ends on February 15, 2024. After that, Atlassian and the Marketplace partners no longer offer technical support, security updates or bug fixes for critical vulnerabilities.

With the introduction of the "Data Center" licenses, the license model was changed to rental. Operation remains the responsibility of the customer. Technically and functionally, "Data Center" installations offer more options, even if these are not needed equally by every customer.

In parallel to Data Center, Atlassian also offers its products in the cloud as a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution. Here, Atlassian operates the instances technically and provides access via the Internet. Operating costs and usage rights are part of the monthly or annual rental fees.

In addition to a change in minimum quantities (from "server" to "data center" (min. 500 users) licensing), the costs multiply when switching from relatively inexpensive server licensing, where only annual maintenance fees were due, to "data center" and "cloud" licensing.

Basically, the following three alternatives can be identified:

1) Remained with "server" licensing:
After all, these are permanent usage rights that can still be used after support ends. However, customers can then no longer benefit from functional innovations (incl. new Marketplace applications) and they also no longer receive support for critical vulnerabilities, which have been increasing recently.

2) Migration to an alternative tool:
In the case of a change to one or more other solutions, it should be analyzed beforehand exactly which functionalities are required and whether a migration is economical in terms of overall costs. In view of the only remaining period until the "Server" support end date, it has recently become possible to obtain an additional year of support for the "Server" licenses until February 15, 2025 as part of Atlassian's "Dual Use Licensing" offer when purchasing a one-year cloud subscription (for > 1,000 users for Jira / Confluence or > 250 agents for Jira Service Management).

3) Enterprise License Agreement (ELA) instead of à la carte licensing:
Depending on the scope of use, concluding an ELA agreement can offer cost advantages over standard licensing ("à la carte"). Some considerations are summarized below.

Atlassian offers an ELA contract for customers with at least 5,000 users. This is a contract model where licensing is based on the number of people per product, regardless of the number of instances they are authorized to use, and even in the cloud (hence also called "Hybrid ELA"). Major differences compared to à la carte licensing are:

Whether an ELA contract offers cost advantages depends on the individual customer situation. In addition to the current and future planned instances, possible demand developments and the added value through included ELA services (e.g. Premier Support, training credits) must also be included in the consideration. Furthermore, the ELA contract offers some possibilities for individual special agreements with Atlassian, which are not possible via à la carte licensing.

You are also faced with the decision of how to proceed with your Atlassian licensing? We are happy to support you: starting with the needs assessment, through the evaluation of licensing scenarios, to the negotiation with the software provider. Just get in touch with us.

Author: Felix Baran