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Dell Simplifies Software Audits with New Version of Dell KACE K1000 Management Appliance

By Rajani Baburajan, TMCnet Contributor

Dell has unveiled the latest version of its Dell KACE (News - Alert) K1000 Management Appliance, a flagship product in Dell Software’s endpoint systems management portfolio, designed to simplify the task of responding to software audits.

By adding new capabilities for automated and integrated software asset management, Dell (News - Alert) KACE K1000 Management Appliance helps customers improve software compliance, reduce unnecessary license costs and accelerate software migrations.

The new appliance now includes automated software asset identification, tracking and optimization for managing the deployment, operation and retirement of an organization’s critical software assets. The software tracks, assesses and ensures software license compliance across multiple versions as well as inconsistent package and component names.

The Dell KACE K1000 Management Appliance also reduces the burden of determining software usage that is typical in today’s complex software licensing scenarios. Dell Software can empower organizations of all sizes to identify software licenses with great accuracy while making it easy to reclaim and reallocate underutilized software.

“Constant market changes such as mergers, acquisitions and product End-of-Life (EOL) announcements often increase an organization’s risk of exposure to non-compliance fines or software overspending,” said David Kloba, general manager of endpoint systems management for Dell Software, in a statement.

Monitoring of software usage and usage patterns has been challenging due to many reasons. Despite the fact that software infringement liability can equal up to three times the retail value of each unlicensed software installation, many companies have not yet adopted appropriate measures.

Dell KACE K1000 Management Appliance now includes software titling engine that automates detailed software audit and compliance reporting to avoid license violations and associated fines.

The solution integrates with the Dell Application Catalog (DAC), which provides access to approximately 110 million unique executable files. DAC offers deep cataloguing capabilities with the ability to map minor software versions to the parent package for more accurate license tracking and usage across major versions of Microsoft (News - Alert) Windows and Apple applications.

Another capability, automated metering, enables administrators to view usage information based on when an application is actually run, for accurate compliance reporting and fast identification of underutilized software.