Audit,

What is an Oracle license audit?

Short Answer

The contractual agreement to provide reasonable assistance and access to information that enables Oracle to measure your usage of its software without unreasonably interfering.

In-Depth Answer

First, if you are being audited by Oracle right now, then check out our Getting Audit? page. If not, then consider our Audit Defense page for all you should be doing to prepare for the inevitable.

Most customers understand Oracle’s long-standing reputation as an aggressive license auditor. What most don’t get is how ambiguously audit is defined, the latitude they have to push back, and that threats typically turn to begging. This is not to say license compliance isn’t a serious matter to be pursued in good faith. Rather, if Oracle prioritized compliance over revenue, then it would integrate license keys into its software rather than give it away online.

Remend serves the audit defense market because Oracle created it, we’re good at it, and customers ask us to. That said, we consider audit defense akin to ambulance chasing given the minefield of unbudgeted expense it often creates for unsuspecting customers. The best case outcome of an audit is actually to reduce long-term total cost by wisely gaming the audit. The problem is most customers ignore license compliance until formally required to pay attention upon receiving an audit letter from Oracle.

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