How Redress Compliance delivered $4.2 million in savings over three years for a Chicago-based IT professional services company with 10,000+ employees — through deployment analysis, role-based licence optimisation, industry benchmarking, and strategic EA renewal negotiation that reduced overall costs by 22%.
A leading IT professional services company headquartered in Chicago, with over 10,000 employees and clients across the United States, engaged Redress Compliance to assist with its Microsoft Enterprise Agreement (EA) renewal. The company's IT infrastructure supported diverse operations including client project management, software development, and cloud-based services.
With an upcoming EA renewal representing a significant recurring software expenditure, the company needed to analyse deployments, optimise licence allocations, develop a roadmap for cloud adoption, benchmark against industry peers, and negotiate flexible terms aligned with its dynamic, project-driven business model. Given the company's rapid growth and evolving service offerings, a strategic approach to licensing management was essential.
IT professional services companies face a distinctive Microsoft licensing challenge: highly variable demand driven by client project cycles. Consultants, developers, and project managers move between engagements with different technology requirements — some needing full E5 suites, others requiring only basic productivity tools, and many needing Azure dev/test environments that spin up and down with project timelines. Microsoft's standard EA model assumes stable, predictable headcounts with uniform licence requirements — a poor fit for services firms where workforce composition and technology needs shift quarterly. Without project-aware optimisation and flexible volume adjustment terms, IT services companies routinely over-provision by 20–30%.
Conducted a comprehensive review of the company's entire Microsoft estate:
Identified substantial cost reduction opportunities aligned with the services business model:
Collaborated with IT leadership to define a three-year technology roadmap:
Leveraged Redress Compliance's proprietary benchmark database for competitive positioning:
Developed and executed a data-driven negotiation plan for maximum savings:
| Metric | Detail |
|---|---|
| Annual Savings: Licence Optimisation | $2,700,000 per year |
| Additional Savings: Negotiated Discounts | $1,500,000 over 3 years |
| Total Savings (3-Year Term) | $4,200,000 |
| Overall Cost Reduction | 22% reduction in licensing costs |
| Compliance Status | Fully compliant with all Microsoft licensing policies |
| Operational Efficiency | Streamlined licensing management across multiple business units |
| Cloud Readiness | Advanced Microsoft solutions adopted for enhanced client service delivery |
| Governance | Improved visibility into licensing usage and costs across all divisions |
"Redress Compliance's expertise was instrumental in our Microsoft EA renewal. Their strategic approach helped us reduce costs, optimize our licensing, and secure an agreement that supports our long-term goals. Their insights were invaluable."CIO — IT Professional Services Company, Chicago
IT professional services companies with project-driven workforces require fundamentally different EA structures than traditional enterprises. The combination of deployment analysis across dynamic project teams, role-based optimisation for consultants vs developers vs corporate staff, industry benchmarking against peer services firms, and evidence-based negotiation typically delivers 20–25% reductions in overall EA cost. Microsoft's standard renewal proposals assume stable, uniform headcounts — services companies that accept these terms without independent advisory pay for licences their workforce doesn't need and miss flexible volume adjustment provisions that align costs with actual business demand.
As a fully independent advisory firm, Redress Compliance provides objective Microsoft EA advisory, licence optimisation, and negotiation support — with no commercial relationship with Microsoft.
Redress Compliance provides expert Microsoft EA advisory — with deep benchmarking data from 500+ enterprise deals and specialists who understand Microsoft's pricing, discounting, and negotiation tactics. We've saved IT services companies across North America millions through optimised, role-aligned, project-aware licensing structures.