Flexera SaaS Manager connector

FlexNet Manager Suite version 2020 R1

For software as a service (SaaS) applications, Flexera SaaS Manager is a great tool for managing your license subscriptions, related usage, and so on. This release of FlexNet Manager Suite provides a straight-forward connector that lets you bring all your SaaS license overviews into the 'single pane of glass' where you manage all your software assets.

Once authorized, the connector imports all relevant data from Flexera SaaS Manager into FlexNet Manager Suite each night, updating local license records to show the latest entitlements, and including these in the nightly license consumption calculations. Each of these imported licenses, 'mirroring' the ones you created in Flexera SaaS Manager, includes a hyperlink that allows you to switch back to the original license records for any needed adjustments. You may also choose to add information to the licenses in FlexNet Manager Suite, such as customizing the license name (perhaps adding "from FSM" for ease of grouping and recognition), linking contracts or purchases (for information only, since the real entitlements are imported nightly from Flexera SaaS Manager), adding management owners and the like. Such details are preserved through each night's imported update.

This single connector obsoletes three earlier SaaS connectors (although these also remain available for customers who have not licensed Flexera SaaS Manager):

• Microsoft Office 365 (deprecated)
• Microsoft 365
• Salesforce.

If you have been previously using any of these connectors, new documentation in the FlexNet Manager Suite Inventory Adapters and Connectors Reference PDF document (linked from the title page of online help) steps through best practice housekeeping to make the switch to the Flexera SaaS Manager connector and optionally remove any license duplication. As a precaution, the first import from your authorized connector to Flexera SaaS Manager automatically marks any licenses from those earlier connectors with a status of Retired, so that from that night forward, the old license records no longer have any effect in the nightly license reconciliation. From that point on, everything is driven through your Flexera SaaS Manager records, conveniently visible from within FlexNet Manager Suite.

The only prerequisites for this connector are that:

• You have licensed both products
• You have installed FlexNet Beacon version 15.0.0 or later on an Internet-facing inventory beacon (access through a proxy server is also supported). This is the inventory beacon version included in this 2020 R1 release.

Even though your implementation of FlexNet Manager Suite is on-premises, and Flexera SaaS Manager is a cloud-only product, the connector runs nightly (at the time you schedule) and integrates all the required information. Configuration is straight-forward, and fully documented in the online help for your inventory beacon.