Software Contracts: Key Issues
75 minutes – 10am PT / 1pm ET
Software contracts are more complex than ever. Whether it’s on-premises software licensing or acquiring cloud services, it is important to be able to identify, address and negotiate key issues.
The following legal, operational and practical issues that arise in preparing for and negotiating software licenses will be discussed:
- Primary Distinctions between SaaS (cloud computing) and On-Premises (In-house)
- Parties to the contract:
- Authorized users: How the definition impacts who can use and your fees
- Warranties
- Do the warranties match the vendor’s proposal?
- Are minimum hardware and software requirements listed?
- What warranties should be included?
- Issues Applicable to Cloud Contracts
- Service Level Agreements: Uptime; Service Level Credits
- Data Security: Minimum requirements; Data breach
- Disaster Recovery/ Business continuity plans
- Issues Applicable to On-premises Software
- Maintenance and Support: Mandatory? What is included/excluded? Caps on increases?
- Severity levels and service level response times
- If you cancel, can you reinstate? Are there reinstatement fees?
- Indemnification
- Type of IP – Patent/copyright/trade secrets/trademark
- Financial limitations; remedies
- Termination
- Who can? What circumstances?
- Remedies
TAKE AWAYS
- Understand and analyze the legal and operational issues in software licenses
- Find hidden prohibitions on certain uses and other pitfalls in vendor form licenses
- Understand the different issues between on premises and cloud software
- Comprehensive power point slide deck for future reference in negotiating software contracts.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND? Procurement, Sales, Contract Professionals, and anyone involved with contracts
If you’d like to submit a question for discussion, please email leslie@inkthedealseminars.com, in advance
Leslie S. Marell
Attorney | Speaker | Developer | Author