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Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships.AI is transforming the business landscape, but with innovation comes new legal and ethical challenges. In this episode ofInsights for IT Negotiations, hosts John Belden and Kylie Chisholm speak with Sarah Alt, Chief Process and AI Officer at Michael Best, about the evolving landscape of AI legislation, ethical considerations, and the responsibilities of IT buyers and vendors. From Wisconsin’s AI legislative study to the global impact of the EU AI Act, this discussion provides key insights for IT decision-makers. Sarah also shares her top three rules for evaluating AI-powered solutions.Resources:Follow Sarah on LinkedInLEGISTLATION TRACKER–Michael Best

As the biggest SaaS vendors (Microsoft, ServiceNow, and Salesforce) pivot to consumption-based licensing models for AI products and services, how will it impact customers' pricing and long-term value? In this episode, we break down the major industry licensing shift, what’s driving it on the vendors' side, and what customers need to negotiate to ensure they aren’t left behind. From upfront discounts to renewal protections and volume discount structures, we discuss the key strategies businesses must adopt to navigate this changing landscape. If you have an upcoming negotiation, this is a must-listen!Explore ourAdvisory Services here.

Salesforce just made a game-changing announcement—combining the COO and CFO roles into one, appointing Robin Washington to lead the charge. But with longtime executives Brian Millham and Amy Weaver stepping down, the market is reacting with skepticism. In this episode, we break down what this leadership shift means for Salesforce’s AI-driven future, how customers should prepare for these changes, and why Benioff is doubling down on Agentforce. Stay tuned for expert insights on what’s next for the cloud giant.

In this episode, we dive into the latest Salesforce renewal negotiations and the growing emphasis on AI and Data Cloud. With Salesforce pushing hard for Agentforce adoption, our Salesforce expert breaks down what this means for customers, the hidden costs behind consumption-based pricing, and the strategies you need to maximize value from your existing investments. Learn how to navigate pricing structures, secure discounts, and avoid future surprises. If you're a Salesforce customer facing renewal discussions, this is an episode you can't afford to miss! Learn more about how we can support your Salesforce negotiations by exploring our Salesforce Advisory Services.

Microsoft just reported its Q2 FY2025 earnings, highlighting strong cloud growth but falling short on future guidance. With AI-driven revenue at the forefront, Microsoft is pushing hard for greater adoption of Copilot, Microsoft 365 E5, and Azure services. If you’re an enterprise customer, this is the moment to negotiate better pricing, ensure transparency, and secure renewal protections. Microsoft needs you to use more—leverage that to get the best deal possible. Don’t miss this breakdown from UpperEdge’s expert Microsoft advisor on what it all means for your business. For more innovative IT sourcing and risk mitigation insights, subscribe to the UpperEdge newsletter and follow UpperEdge on LinkedIn and Twitter.

ServiceNow just reported its Q4 FY2024 earnings, revealing strong revenue growth but falling slightly short of analysts’ expectations. AI remains a major focus, with significant growth in its ProPlus offerings and a push toward increased customer adoption of Now Assist. With ambitious revenue targets of $15 billion by 2026 and $30 billion in the future, ServiceNow is looking to expand its footprint across IT, HR, and customer service. If you’re a customer, now is the time to negotiate better value and ensure transparency in pricing and consumption models. Don’t miss this deep dive from our ServiceNow expert advisor on what it all means for you. For more innovative IT sourcing and risk mitigation insights, subscribe to the UpperEdge newsletter and follow UpperEdge on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. In this first episode of 2025, John and Kylie explore the key market forces set to shape the IT vendor landscape in the year ahead. They discuss the maturity of generative AI and its impact on Systems Integrators, the rising challenge of technical debt, and the federal policies that could significantly impact IT budgets and vendor strategies. Tune in for expert insights on how these trends will influence IT negotiations and how UpperEdge can help organizations navigate the shifting landscape. Resources: GRAPHIC – Visit the UpperEdge landing page for this episode to see an infographic on these market forces BLOG – Generative AI and AI Infrastructur

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by ⁠UpperEdge⁠, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie are talking with EY’s SAP CTO, Michael Casey, and Managing Director, Gaurav Rastogi, to dive into SAP ERP implementations, EY’s AI innovations, and how Michael and Gaurav see the landscape evolving with Generative AI. Tune in to learn more about their EY.AI platform, “human in the middle” approach to Generative AI, and how to holistically navigate your SAP ERP program. Michael Casey has over 27 years of experience delivering large-scale ERP transformations and working with industry leaders. As the CTO of EY’s SAP and ERP practice, Michael focuses on the deep end of technology as it relates to large-scale systems implement

Salesforce’s Q3 FY25 total revenue came in at $9.44B, representing an 8% growth year-over-year. This came in slightly above the $9.35B expected by analysts. While Salesforce did slightly raise the low end of their Full Year FY25 guidance from $37.7B to $37.7B (high end set at $38B), they also maintained an expected single digit revenue growth for FY25 at 8%-9%. It is clear from the earnings call that CEO Marc Benioff and COO Brian Millham will push their sales organization, which will have 1000 new members soon, to get more customers to start using their AI Agent offering Agentforce. Salesforce had 200 Agentforce wins in Q3. It was also clear that Salesforce will be pitching Data Cloud as part of a package deal with Agentforce. The push on customers is expected to be aggressive given the important role adopting these products will play in driving revenue growth for Salesforce moving forward. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what Salesforce’s earnings mean for customers an

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie are talking with UpperEdge’s expert Managed Services advisor, Scott Braverman, about Generative AI’s impact on Managed Services offerings, specifically in the field services sector. They discuss why field services will likely be the most impacted by Gen AI and give tips for evaluating Gen AI in a field services environment. Resources: BLOG – 4 Actions to Enable Gen AI Success in Field Services WEBINAR – Mitigating Cloud Transformation Risks in AWS, Azure, and MSP Relationships For a more tailored conversation around your Managed Services and Gen AI goals, explore our Managed Services Advisory to see how UpperEdge can hel

Microsoft announced their FY25 Q1 earnings last evening. Total revenue was reported as $65.6B, better than the $64.5B that analysts were expecting. The critically important Microsoft Cloud revenue, which includes Azure, O365 Commercial, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, and other cloud products, came in at $38.B, representing a 22% increase year-over-year. Microsoft’s go-forward success and revenue growth (including ARPU growth) will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft’s ability to expand their Cloud revenue and AI Business revenue, which is tracking towards becoming a $10B business. Their success will also be tied to getting more customers to adopt and use their AI solutions, like Microsoft 365 Copilot, GitHub Copilot, Copilot Studio and the agents built in Copilot, as well as get more customers to migrate to the costly all-in Microsoft 365 E5 suite. In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how Microsoft customers can take advantage of Microsoft’s needs, clear goals and focus are

ServiceNow’s FY24 Q3 subscription revenue came in at $2.72B, representing 23% growth year-over-year while, once again, beating guidance and analyst expectations. ServiceNow also raised their full year FY24 subscription revenue guidance, now expecting somewhere between $10.65B and $10.66B, about a 23% growth. In this podcast, ServiceNow Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what customers should expect from ServiceNow over the course of the upcoming year as the vendor does everything it can to enhance their position as a leader in the highly competitive GenAI and “AI Agents” space.  More specifically, ServiceNow will continue to be focused on ramping upgrades and adoption of “Pro Plus” while also continuing to upsell and cross sell their current customers and adding net new logos. Adam also shares how customers can leverage ServiceNow’s clear goals tied to particular industries and product adoptions during their upcoming ServiceNow negotiations and renewals. For more innovative IT sourcing and risk mitiga

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie are talking with UpperEdge’s expert Workday advisors, Jeff Lazarto and Erwann Couesbot, about the ways you can strategically elevate your Workday negotiations to maximize success. Jeff and Erwann discuss Workday licensing basics, key financial and commercial terms, and how Gen AI could impact your Workday negotiation strategy moving forward. Resources: ON-DEMAND WEBINAR – Elevate Your Workday Negotiations to Maximize Success BLOG – Evaluating Workday’s LDP: Critical Insights for Small & Mid-Sized Businesses COMPLIMENTARY ASSESSMENT – SmartDeal by UpperEdge For a more tailored conversation around your Workday relati

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie are talking with UpperEdge’s Salesforce expert advisor, Adam Mansfield, about the vendor’s recent Dreamforce event and the big new release that came out of it: Agentforce. Adam breaks down what Agentforce is, how it’s priced, what products it integrates with, and how customers should approach their upcoming Salesforce renewals and negotiations now that Agentforce will be pushed on them. Resources: UPCOMING WEBINAR – Proven Salesforce Negotiation Strategies for Maximizing Value SALESFORCE NEWSLETTER – Resources for After Dreamforce BLOG – How to Prepare for Your Salesforce Negotiation For a more tailored conversation ar

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie are taking a deep dive into the various Generative AI platforms, specifically AWS SageMaker, Microsoft Azure AI and Nvidia AI Enterprise. John breaks down what each of these platforms offer, how they compare to and differ from one another, and the pricing structure for each platform to help you make the most informed decision in your evaluations. Resources: PODCAST –9 Predictions for Generative AI in ERP Implementations ON-DEMAND WEBINAR –Vendor AI-Enabled Delivery Models: Extracting Value from Your IT Suppliers BLOG – Generative AI: Reshaping SI Engagements and the Client Advantage For a more tailored conversation ar

Salesforce’s Q1 FY25 total revenue came in at $9.325B, representing an 8% growth year-over-year. This came in slightly above the $9.225B expected by analysts. Operating Margin came in at 33.7%, beating the analyst expected 31.94%. While Salesforce did raise their FY25 operating margin guidance to 32.8%, they also maintained their expected single digit (8%-9%) revenue guidance for FY25, citing a predicted deceleration in license revenue growth for the back half of the year. In addition to revenue numbers, it was also announced during the earnings call that CFO Amy Weaver will be stepping down. It is clear from the earnings call that CEO Marc Benioff and COO Brian Millham will push their sales organization to get customers to start using their Agentforce AI offerings once it becomes available. Agentforce AI, along with Salesforce’s Data Cloud solution, will be aggressively pushed on customers to help Salesforce meet their revenue goals. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses what

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by ⁠UpperEdge⁠, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie chatted with ⁠Sam Bayaa, the Practice Leader for UpperEdge's Project Execution Advisory Services, to discuss how digital transformation implementation methods are affected by GenerativeAI. Sam speaks to the risks associated with implementing digital transformations in the age of AI, how companies can successfully mitigate those risks, and how leaders can manager these implementations effectively to ensure success. Resources Mentioned: PODCAST - Predictions for Generative AI’s Impact on ERP Implementations – A Mid-Year Update BLOG –⁠ Don’t Become an ERP Horror Story – Implement Solid Risk Management BLOG - Fear o

Microsoft announced their FY24 Q4 earnings recently, and the total Q4 revenue was reported as $64.7B, better than the $64.39B analysts were expecting. The critically important Microsoft Cloud revenue, which includes Azure, O365 Commercial, LinkedIn, Dynamics 365, and other cloud product, came in at $36.8B, representing a 21% increase year-over-year. Microsoft’s go-forward success and revenue growth (ARPU growth) will continue to be directly tied to Microsoft’s ability get more customers to adopt their AI solutions (Copilot for Microsoft 365, Copilot for Sales, Copilot for Service, GitHub Copilot, and Azure OpenAI) and increase volume over time. It is also heavily tied to Microsoft customers migrating to the costly all-in Microsoft 365 E5 suite.  Microsoft also must continue to focus on getting customers to accelerate their Azure consumption and, at the very least, maintain current Unified Support. In this podcast, our Microsoft Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses how enterprise customers can take advan

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by ⁠UpperEdge⁠, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie reflected on some predictions John made at the beginning of 2024 regarding how Generative AI would impact ERP implementations. John provides critical insights into data privacy, recent litigation, and SI delivery models and shares how your top IT suppliers may be using AI to win your business. Resources Mentioned: PODCAST –⁠9 Predictions for Generative AI in ERP Implementations SAPPHIRE CONTENT - Sapphire 2024: What We Learned from SAP's Annual Conference Other Resources: ON-DEMAND WEBINAR - Vendor AI-Enabled Delivery Models: Extracting Value from Your IT Suppliers⁠⁠ BLOG - Generative AI: Reshaping SI Enga

Welcome to Insights for IT Negotiations, a podcast by UpperEdge, a leading IT sourcing, negotiation, and project execution advisory firm. Join John Belden, UpperEdge’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, and Kylie Chisholm, UpperEdge’s Marketing Manager, every other week as they share valuable insights to help you maximize the value of your key IT relationships. This week, John and Kylie chatted with Shane Griffin, one of UpperEdge’s Oracle advisors, to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) and Oracle's Universal Credits model. These licensing models are notoriously tricky to unravel, but understand the key components of the services can help you effectively evaluate and negotiate with Oracle. This episode gives you the strategies you need to better understand and leverage these models. Resources Mentioned: UPCOMING WEBINAR – Vendor AI-Enabled Delivery Models: Extracting Value from Your IT Suppliers ON-DEMAND WEBINAR – Unraveling Oracle’s OCI and Universal Credit Model Other Resources: BLOG POST – 5