What's new in VCPP Pricing, Metering, and Reporting: November 2021 Update

What's new in VCPP Pricing, Metering, and Reporting: November 2021 Update

First, I wanted to thank everyone that joined us live for the webinar this quarter. We had a great turnout globally and a LOT of engagement from our attendees. If you missed the webinar, we’ve sent an email to all commerce portal users with a link to the recording. If you’d like to be included on the invite next time, make sure someone from your company (cloud provider or aggregator) has added you to the Commerce Portal user list.

As is customary, we want to highlight some of the top updates in Pricing, Metering, and Reporting for Cloud Providers. So let’s jump right in.

Quick Overview:

• No more Bundles!
  • Commerce Portal still shows them but that’s only because of the price protection that’s valid until May 2022​
• Usage Meter 3.6.1, 4.1, and 4.2 are all End-of-General-Support​
  • No EoTG date, so they will be completely done. It is important that you move to the latest version to ensure no lapse in reporting
• Usage Insight is migrating to Cloud Partner Navigator​ for a much better operational experience!
• Sovereign Cloud program was announced at VMworld​
  • This is initially available for select qualified partners​. Get in touch with your sales contact to know more
• Price Protection is ending in May 2022​
  • This will affect partners currently reporting:​
    • Standard w/ Management (8pts)​
    • Advanced w/ Networking & Management (12pts)​

Program Updates

Over 99% of partners are now on the Flex Pricing Model! We’ve automatically migrated the remaining partners who had no price increase, while working hand-in-hand with partners who do, to make sure that everyones concerns were mitigated. We still have some partners with customizations that are left but for the most part the migration is done for over 4400 partners!

Over 77% of partners are using Usage Insight and 70.9% are using Usage Meter 4.X! Thats a HUGE difference from our last webinar. I do want to take this moment and several others in this post to remind everyone that Usage Meter 4.3 or higher is now required to be used in the program. Partners should migrate off of Usage Meter versions 3.6.1, 4.1 and 4.2 immediately. And since UM 4.X requires Usage Insight, partner are required to now sign up for Automatic Reporting on Commerce Portal and register their new Usage Meter 4.3 or higher appliances.

Pricing and Product Usage Guide Updates

The folowing is a list of the changes mentioned in the “What’s New” section of the PUG with a little explanation of the changes.

• VCPP Reporting Requirements Updates
  • Since UM 3.6.1 is officially no longer supported in any capacity, the PUG was updated to reflect that UM 4.3 and higher are required by partners for monthly reporting. This also means that since UM 4.X requires Usage Insight, then automatic reporting and Usage Insight are required.
• Usage Insight
  • VUI is split across the CSP and CPN platforms, but transitioning to CPN for all partners. There is also a new self-service invite process built into Commerce Portal!
• VMware Cloud Director Availability
  • Removed content related to VCDA 2.0
• NSX Adv Load Balancer
  • Reverting back to One-Off Ordering for entitlements. This has no effect on allowance for using NSX Adv Load Balancer Basic edition with Flex Core. No pricing adjustments, just how you get licenses.
• VSAN Enterprise
  • Replacing old “with Enterprise add-on” versions. The add-on SKU’s will be available until Feb 2022 and require manual adjustment of units to move from VSAN Enterprise to older SKU’s
• VMware Cloud Director for VCF
  • Updates to content and descriptions, no price adjustments
• Tanzu Basic is now included in Flex Core
  • No Term contract needed for Tanzu Basic, and partners will be provided licenses directly into their my.vmware accounts! So if you’ve been interested in supporting Modern Apps, this is how to get started!
• Appedix A – NSX DC Features Comparison
  • Updates to the features comparison content.

Usage Meter and Metering Updates in General

If you haven’t heard already, Usage Meter 3.6.1, 4.1 and 4.2 are no longer supported in any capacity. Partners must upgrade to Usage Meter 4.3 or 4.4 immediately.

If you are using Usage Meter 3.6.1, I recommend deploying a new Usage Meter 4.4 appliance immediately and set it to test mode when you register it in Commerce Portal. Usage Insight has stopped automatically reporting UM 3.6.1 reports to Commerce Portal after the October MBO.

If you are using Usage Meter 4.1 or 4.2, perform an in-place upgrade immediately. Don’t wait. Usage Meter 4.1 and 4.2 will stop being processed into reports starting after the November MBO (December 5th).

Do. Not. Wait. To. Upgrade.

Usage Insight on Cloud Services Portal (CSP) is being migrated to Cloud Partner Navigator (CPN). Many partners have been automatically migrated but there are still more to go. Partners that were not migrated was because of non-valid address or services in use that CPN does not support yet (Skyline). Skyline work is underway and we are close to migrating those partners.

Usage Meter 4.5 is coming!!!

In Usage Meter 4.5, we will be introducing the following features, and releasing this version in early to mid-December:

• Collector Changes
  • New NSX Features Metered
  • New VSAN Features Metered
  • vRealize Operations Manager Enhancements
    • Remove Auto-Discovery to allow for using Virtual IP’s from Highly Available deployments
    • Support License Groups to meter vROps objects based on edition applied in the vROps inventory
  • Horizon!!!
    • We are now able to meter Horizon 7.9 and later starting with Usage Meter 4.5
    • Please Note: Does not support mixed environments and it does not yet support NSX and VSAN for Desktop
• Appliance Changes
  • Virtual Appliance Management Interface (Backend GUI)
    • Manage Network Config
    • Manage Photon OS Firewall Rules
    • View Resource Utilization
    • + More
  • Hashing Control
    • Ability to opt-out of hashing all or specific fields for data anonymization, this can help make the virtual machine history report more readable if you’d like.
    • Ability to opt-in to redacted mode to make the reports even MORE unreadable.

Reporting Updates

For partners using NSX DC SP Advanced, the Commerce Portal would typically take that usage, regardless of vRealize Operations Manager edition used and move the usage into the 12pt bundle SKU for Price Protection because this is how we have historically charged that product. Well, thanks to the Flex Pricing Model, we are adjusting the discounting methods for Price Protection to make sure all partners are correctly reporting based on Flex. If you want to know more, I would suggest checking out the recording that was emailed.

Commerce Portal also adds a new method for getting a Cloud Partner Navigator (CPN) invitation. Take a look at the documentation here.

Additional Resources

During the call we discussed a number of other documents. Here is a link to those discussed!

Recommendations for Partners:

• Migrate to NSX-T today!
  • Transition before VMware NSX for vSphere goes into the end of general support in January 2022.
  • There are lots of resources available to help you with the migration. Learn more here and get in touch with your sales contact
• If you are running UM 3.6.X​
  • UM 3.6 to UM 4.X requires a new appliance deployment​
  • Deploy a new UM 4.4 appliance or 4.5 if you wait until December​
  • Set as a test for the month deployed, then change to production after reporting that months MBO​
• If you are running UM 4.1 or 4.2​
  • Perform an in-place upgrade to UM 4.4 Immediately, do not wait for UM 4.5​
  • UM 4.X to UM 4.X does not require a full appliance deployment any longer​
• If you are on VUI on CSP​
  • We will auto migrate you to CPN soon​
• If you are not using VUI yet​
  • Request your CPN invite immediately. Do not wait.

That’s all for the November 2021 update! We will schedule the next one in the first quarter of next year! If you want to join us live or get notified about the recording, make sure that you have access to the Commerce Portal at vcp.vmware.com! We send invitations to all Commerce Portal users.

See you next time!
– The VCPP Usage & Commerce Team