Additional Details and Information about License Relief Program Announced Monday

On Monday I posted about the License Relief Program that we announced in conjunction with the State of Louisiana. In addition, yesterday David Geer of Channel Pro Magazine posted several answers to questions he had in an interview I did with him around this initiative.

To help answer some questions people may have about the offer, here is a collection of information about this program:

  • The License Relief Program was announced on Monday and will launch in September (date to be announced)
  • It is designed to assist Small Businesses in the 30 most affected parishes in Louisiana from the Hurricanes
  • To participate in the program, Small Businesses must meet the following criteria:
    • Have been in business before August 29, 2005, the date of Hurricane Katrina's landfall, or September 24, 2005, the date of Hurricane Rita;
    • Be based in one of the 30 federal disaster-designated Louisiana parishes
    • Have fewer than 200 employees
    • Have applied for small business assistance through SBA or SBDC, though the application need not have been approved for aid
    • Purchase a new Microsoft Open Value License Agreement for business software
    • Submit first year invoice from software reseller to LSBDC (Microsoft pays for the first year upon verification of proof of qualifying purchase).
  • All Microsoft products available through the Open License Value licensing program are included in this offer
  • Purchases can be made from any Microsoft Open Value reseller, including all local Microsoft Small Business Specialists. (Read about the impact a Microsoft Small Business Specialist had right after Hurricane Katrina)
  • All Microsoft Partners can sell the Open Value licensing program (Microsoft Partners can process Open Value license agreements through Authorized Open Value Distributors)
  • Licenses acquired through this program will include all eligible Open Value benefits, including: License to install/run software, three years of upgrade protection, electronic training programs (eLearning) for software licenses acquired, Microsoft Home-use rights (if Microsoft Office purchased), electronic license protection, “cold” backups for disaster recovery for server software, and more.
  • Since licenses acquired through this program are Open Value, they include downgrade rights, which means if affected Small Businesses have older hardware that cannot run the latest version of the software acquired, they can install a prior version instead and then have license rights to the latest version acquired when they wish at no additional cost.
  • The three years of spread payments offered through the Open Value program have no interest or finance charges.
  • Businesses wishing to use Microsoft Financing for their purchase of software, hardware, and Partner services would need to check with their Microsoft Financing Partner for current rates.

Hopefully this helps answer many of the questions you have about this program. If there are others, you know where to find me. J

Thank you and have a wonderful day,

Eric Ligman
Microsoft US Senior Manager
Small Business Community Engagement
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

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