Beyond the Dashboard: Engineering Software Visibility with ServiceNow and Open iT

[00:00] Host: Welcome to Beyond the Dashboard: Engineering Software Visibility with ServiceNow and Open iT. We’ve got live Q&A at the end, so drop questions in as we go. Today’s speakers: Evan, Senior Advisory Solution Consultant for Asset Management at ServiceNow; Jatin, Senior Product Manager at ServiceNow; and Malou, Solutions Architect at Open iT.

[01:03] Host: Agenda: first, why engineering software visibility is harder than it looks. Then how Open iT solves the usage-data side, and how ServiceNow SAM adds governance and action. Then a live demo from Malou and Jatin, and Q&A.

[02:03] Evan: Quick poll before we start: how are you currently managing engineering software in your SAM environment? (Results: fairly split between managing it outside ServiceNow, still evaluating an approach, managing it separately, and using ServiceNow plus another tool.)

[04:01] Evan: Engineering software doesn’t follow one licensing model. You’ve got network, concurrent, floating, and SaaS licenses across different publishers and technologies (Flex LM, DSLS, IBM LUM, Sentinel, Bentley). The real question isn’t who has the software installed, it’s who’s consuming a license right now, for how long, and whether someone else just got denied.

[04:43] Evan: Picture design-freeze week: one team’s pool is maxed out and engineers are hitting denials, while a few floors up a different team’s Bentley pool sits 40% idle because their project wrapped two weeks ago. Both look “active” on a license dashboard. Nothing connects the two until the renewal conversation months later.

[05:54] Evan: Four points of friction sit behind that: demand is volatile, so yesterday’s average doesn’t predict tomorrow’s need; access is constrained, so an exhausted pool means denied requests; data is fragmented, since license managers hold usage/denial data while SAM teams hold entitlements and contracts; and action stays manual, so even a clear pattern needs someone to translate it into a decision.

[07:00] Evan: That’s the gap Open iT closes at the usage-data layer, giving organizations the real picture (not just what’s installed, but what’s used, by whom, when, and from where) through broad metering, optimization, and normalized insight. Open iT collects data from license managers, hosts, dongles, vendor clouds, and SaaS platforms, normalizes it, and delivers it through reporting, BI tools, and integrations like ServiceNow.

[08:41] Evan: So why do you still need ServiceNow SAM? Usage data alone doesn’t tell you what it’s costing you or what to do next. SAM adds scope (your whole software estate, not just engineering), action (turning usage data into a renewal, reclamation, or approval), and governance (one system of record and audit trail). Open iT and ServiceNow do different jobs – you need both to get from usage data to a governed decision.

[10:03] Evan: The partnership is depth plus context: Open iT collects the detailed engineering signals, ServiceNow brings them into the SAM system of record and combines them with entitlements, contracts, and spend. The goal isn’t another dashboard, it’s decision-ready information for renewal, forecasting, compliance, and optimization. Now let’s see it: Malou will cover Open iT, then Jatin will cover ServiceNow.

[11:33] Malou: In the Open iT License Monitor portal, you get real-time utilization across your engineering portfolio, regardless of source. For MATLAB/Simulink, for example: 102 available licenses, 84 in use, 18 available. You can drill into exactly who’s using what, from where, and for how long, and set up alerts (approaching max, license hogs, expirations) for yourself, your team, or even the end users.

[14:49] Malou: Historical data shows whether you’re actually using licenses efficiently. For Simulink, 84 licenses covered 99% of demand, and 47 covered 95% of it. One customer used that to renegotiate: own 47, but get an overdraft for occasional spikes, paid by the hour.

[17:15] Malou: For subscription/named-user licensing (Autodesk AEC, for example), you can see 23 of 26 seats assigned but only 11 actually used, then drill into which named users are active versus never-used, and reassign accordingly.

[19:43] Malou: For consumption/credit-based agreements like Bentley’s token pools, you can analyze session length. We’ve seen a lot of very short sessions; filtering sessions under 15 minutes showed a 12% drop in token consumption, useful for renegotiation.

[21:05] Malou: Open iT also centralizes license server administration (single pane of glass, semantic comparison and version control on license file changes) and normalizes complex engineering licensing data through the True Use engine, so features map correctly to the right product. That’s the foundation; ServiceNow brings the broader SAM context on top of it. Over to Jatin.

[23:29] Jatin: This is Casey’s ServiceNow landing page as software asset manager, filtered to Autodesk and Bentley. She sees compliance status, an AI-driven activity center flagging reclamation rules and 600 removal candidates, and upcoming renewals (Microsoft and Autodesk products due end of August), so she sets success goals to track the work.

[27:08] Jatin: In license compliance, Casey checks Bentley (billed on peak usage): for CivilStorm, she owns 2 peak-device licenses but usage hit 3 in the last 30 days – a gap she now knows to address.

[29:11] Jatin: For Autodesk, compliance isn’t the issue – optimization is. She sees overage on products like Inventor, and confirms suite roll-ups (like the AEC Collection) are mapping correctly. Drilling into Autodesk optimization specifically, she finds about $6.98K in potential savings from underused subscriptions, broken down by product (for example, 4 low-usage candidates on 3ds Max worth about $800).

[33:14] Jatin: The Engineering License Overview dashboard mirrors what Malou showed in Open iT, but in ServiceNow’s single pane of glass: total spend, top denied products, low-utilization products, and usage by user and department, so Casey can plan chargebacks and know where to add or reclaim licenses. She closes out her success goals and exports compliance reports for stakeholders. Back to Ian and Kevin.

[38:02] Ian: Closing poll: what would provide the most value from integrating engineering usage data with ServiceNow? (Results: split between a single view of ownership/usage, and better forecasting/budgeting/chargeback and renewal data.) Now, Q&A.

[40:11] Ian: Can ServiceNow automate chargeback based on usage? Jatin: Yes – you get visibility into user, department, and cost center, and can generate reports for chargeback.

[40:59] Ian: What does the integration require? Jatin: A dedicated store app for engineering apps, plus ServiceNow SAM and a data source like Open iT. Full subscription-licensing support requires the Australia release.

[42:32] Ian: What companies use both platforms? Malou: Can’t share names publicly, but customers span manufacturing, energy, automotive, and aerospace – mostly large organizations. Reach out directly for references.

[43:57] Kevin: (Audio cut out mid-question about bringing usage data into another tool; name unclear in the recording.) The panel offered to follow up by e-mail rather than guess.

[45:01] Kevin: Quick plug: ServiceNow’s Nexus event is October 7–8 in Santa Clara – two days, roadmaps and demos, free to attend (travel not included), 300+ customers expected and 17 sponsoring partners including Open iT.

[46:21] Ian: Remaining questions will be answered by e-mail, and the deck will go out to all registrants. Thanks for joining.