Nutanix Appliance Vs Nutanix NX Core based Licensing

Nutanix has been decoupled the Nutanix licensing strategy in Nutanix NX Appliance, Nutanix NX core appliance and CBL – Capacity Based License to reach out to small business and mid range business customers, of-course to increase the business revenue.

Nutanix Licensing

Nutanix licensing basically included three primary components :

1. Hardware
2. Hardware Support
3. Term-based software and software support entitlement

Now Nutanix is following DXC technology to tied with other OEMs to become channel partner selling preinstalled Nutanix enterprise cloud OS software with hardware vendors i.e Dell, HPE, Lenovo, Cisco etc. hardware as HCI appliance.

So, Customer(s) want to purchase any vendor’s hardware to enable the Nutanix HCI technology then Nutanix will charge only for Nutanix OS software and support service, the hardware cost and support will be taken care by the third party OEM hardware vendor.

Read more : Become Expert On Nutanix License Management

Nutanix Licensing Term

Nutanix divided the Nutanix licensing in three term

1. Nutanix NX Appliance
2. Nutanix NX Core Appliance
3. CBL – Capacity Based License

I will explain above the Nutanix licensing term below in the post.
Keep reading..

Read more : Reclaim Nutanix license

Nutanix NX Appliance Licensing

Nutanix NX appliance licensing is valid to NX – G4 and NX – G5 models only.
Beyond this series Nutanix NX core appliance or CBL licensing will be applicable.

Note : Nutanix will continue to support NX appliance or node-based licensing for customer who previously procured node-based licenses (NBL).
Exact duration of this transition is still to be determined.

Nutanix NX Core Appliance Licensing

Nutanix NX Core decouples the hardware and software value previously included in the NX appliance included hardware, hardware support, term-based software and support entitlement.

All Nutanix NX – G6 appliances are eligible to be procured utilizing Nutanix NX Core and CBL licensing.

Note : NX-G5 appliances are not eligible for CBL licensing.

Read more : Nutanix Portal : License Tagging Feature

CBL – Capacity Based Licensing ?

Capacity Based License – CBL is a common license model applicable to all Software Choice hardware platforms – including NX Core, XC-Core, HX Certified Nodes, and 3rd-party (e.g., Cisco, HPE) hardware platforms.

For Nutanix software on 3rd party platforms, the licensing model is changing from node-based to cluster – capacity-based to align licensing with the value delivered by Acropolis Software corresponds to “compute and storage under management”, they need Acropolis Software to manage to support their workloads.

CBL Support Service Term

Production (PRD), Mission critical (MCW), Federal (FED-PRD, FED-MCW) and ASP (L3P) levels of support are currently available in CBL. Software maintenance and support are included in the CBL SKUs. HW support is notincluded in CBL SKUs.

CBL Annual Based Term

All CBL licenses are term-based and are available in 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 year terms. Perpetual or life-of-device licenses are not available in the CBL model.

Question : Can NX Core nodes with CBL be mixed with traditional NX appliances in the same cluster?

Answer : Yes, customers may mix Nutanix NX Core appliance with CBL licenses and Nuanix NX appliances with LOD licenses in the same cluster.
But all licenses within a single block must be the same type.

Conclusion

Nutanix licensing strategy is inspired by other software vendor those are selling softwar products on user basis, CPU basis , Core basis, Capacity basis, Feature basis, time frame basis etc. and Vendors i.e Microsoft, Oracle, Splunk, VMware etc.